Portal:Maps

The Maps and Cartography Portal

A map is a symbolic depiction of interrelationships, commonly spatial, between things within a space. A map may be annotated with text and graphics. Like any graphic, a map may be fixed to paper or other durable media, or may be displayed on a transitory medium such as a computer screen. Some maps change interactively. Although maps are commonly used to depict geographic elements, they may represent any space, real or fictional. The subject being mapped may be two-dimensional such as Earth's surface, three-dimensional such as Earth's interior, or from an abstract space of any dimension.

Maps of geographic territory have a very long tradition and have existed from ancient times. The word "map" comes from the medieval Latin: Mappa mundi, wherein mappa meant 'napkin' or 'cloth' and mundi 'of the world'. Thus, "map" became a shortened term referring to a flat representation of Earth's surface. (Full article...)

Cartography (/kɑːrˈtɒɡrəfi/) is the study and practice of making and using maps. Combining science, aesthetics and technique, cartography builds on the premise that reality (or an imagined reality) can be modeled in ways that communicate spatial information effectively. (Full article...)

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The Pink Map (Portuguese: Mapa cor-de-rosa), also known as the Rose-Coloured Map, was a map prepared in 1885 to represent the Kingdom of Portugal's claim of sovereignty over a land corridor connecting the Portuguese colonies of Angola and Mozambique during the Scramble for Africa. The area claimed included most of modern-day Zimbabwe and large parts of modern-day Zambia and Malawi.

In the first half of the 19th century, Portugal held total control over only a small number of coastal settlements in Angola and Mozambique. The Portuguese also claimed suzerainty over other de facto independent towns and nominal Portuguese subjects in the Zambezi valley, but could rarely enforce its claims; most of the territory now within Angola and Mozambique was entirely independent of Portugal's control. Between 1840 and 1869, Portugal expanded the area it controlled but felt threatened by the activities of other European colonial powers in the region. (Full article...)

List of selected articles

General images -

The following are images from various map-related articles on Wikipedia.

Image 1The equidistant projection with Tissot's indicatrix of deformation (from Scale (map))
Image 2Clay tablet with map of the Babylonian city of Nippur (c. 1400 BC) (from History of cartography)
Image 3Modern version of the Roman Tabula Peutingeriana (5th century). (from History of cartography)
Image 4A graphical or bar scale. A map would also usually give its scale numerically ("1:50,000", for instance, means that one cm on the map represents 50,000cm of real space, which is 500 meters) (from Scale (map))
Image 5Al-Masudi's world map (10th century) (from History of cartography)
Image 6Infinitesimal elements on the sphere and a normal cylindrical projection (from Scale (map))
Image 7The Da Ming Hun Yi Tu map, dating c. 1390, exists in multicolour format. (from History of cartography)
Image 8Scale variation for the Lambert (green) and Gall (red) equal area projections. (from Scale (map))
Image 9An early Western Han dynasty (202 BC – 9 AD) silk map found in tomb 3 of Mawangdui Han tombs site, depicting the Kingdom of Changsha and Kingdom of Nanyue in southern China (note: the south direction is oriented at the top, north at the bottom). (from History of cartography)
Image 10A well-composed transit map of Istanbul, with a high degree of contrast between the symbols, creating a strong visual hierarchy (transit lines are and look most important), figure-ground, and selectivity (the green national rail line can be isolated when necessary). Also note the harmonizing subdued tones of green and blue in the background. (from Cartographic design)
Image 11A general map of the world by Samuel Dunn, 1794, containing star chart, map of the Solar System, map of the Moon and other features along with Earth's both hemispheres. (from History of cartography)
Image 12A survey of Boston Harbor from Atlantic Neptune. (from History of cartography)
Image 13Universalis Cosmographia, the Waldseemüller wall map dated 1507, depicts the Americas, Africa, Europe, Asia, and the Pacific Ocean separating Asia from the Americas, by the Italian Amerigo Vespucci. (from History of cartography)
Image 14Possibly the oldest surviving map has been engraved on this mammoth tusk, dated to 25,000 BC, found from Pavlov in the Czech Republic. (from History of cartography)
Image 15The Fra Mauro map, a medieval European map, was made around 1450 by the Italian monk Fra Mauro. It is a circular world map drawn on parchment and set in a wooden frame, about two meters in diameter. (from History of cartography)
Image 16The cartographic process (from Cartographic design)
Image 17A map of Sikkim, India using shaded relief and hypsometric tints (a form of isarithm) to visualize terrain (from Cartographic design)
Image 18CIA map of Iraq, following typical labeling guidelines to maximize legibility and association (from Cartographic design)
Image 19The first Japanese printed map to depict the world, including Europe and America. Printed by woodblock in 1710, composed by the Buddhist monk Rokashi Hotan. (from History of cartography)
Image 20The Tabula Rogeriana, drawn by Muhammad al-Idrisi for Roger II of Sicily in 1154. Note that the north is at the bottom, and so the map appears "upside down" compared to modern cartographic conventions. (from History of cartography)
Image 21Reconstruction of Pomponius Mela's world map. (from History of cartography)
Image 22A chart of an unidentified area (from History of cartography)
Image 23The pundit (explorer) cartographer Nain Singh Rawat (19th century) received a Royal Geographical Society gold medal in 1876. (from History of cartography)
Image 24The world according to Herodotus, 440 BC (from History of cartography)
Image 25Nautical chart by Pedro Reinel (c. 1504), one of the first based on astronomical observations and to depict a scale of latitudes. (from History of cartography)
Image 26Illustrated map (from Cartographic design)
Image 27World Map by Juan de la Cosa (1500), the first map showing the Americas. (from History of cartography)
Image 28A portrait of a Dutch mapmaker looking up intently from his charts and holding a caliper, 1714. (from History of cartography)
Image 29Lambert's normal cylindrical equal-area projection with Tissot's indicatrix of deformation (from Scale (map))
Image 30Charles Joseph Minard's map of Napoleon's Russian campaign of 1812 (1844) has been long recognized as a masterwork of cartographic design at a time when such was difficult and rare. (from Cartographic design)
Image 31Martin Behaim's Erdapfel (1492) is considered to be the oldest surviving terrestrial globe. (from History of cartography)
Image 32A bar scale with the nominal scale expressed as "1:600 000", meaning 1 cm on the map corresponds to 600,000 cm=6 km on the ground. (from Scale (map))
Image 33The Gough Map, a road map of 14th-century Britain (from History of cartography)
Image 34Map of the Holy Land, Pietro Vesconte, 1321. Described by Adolf Erik Nordenskiöld as "the first non-Ptolemaic map of a definite country". (from History of cartography)
Image 35The world according to Hekatæus, 500 BC (from History of cartography)
Image 36The Winkel tripel projection with Tissot's indicatrix of deformation (from Scale (map))
Image 37"Mapa de los Estados Unidos de Méjico by John Distrunell, the 1847 map used during the negotiations of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo ending the Mexican–American War. (from History of cartography)
Image 38The Mercator projection with Tissot's indicatrix of deformation. (The distortion increases without limit at higher latitudes) (from Scale (map))
Image 39The Yu Ji Tu, or Map of the Tracks of Yu Gong, carved into stone in 1137, located in the Stele Forest of Xi'an. This 3 ft (0.91 m) squared map features a graduated scale of 100 li for each rectangular grid. China's coastline and river systems are clearly defined and precisely pinpointed on the map. Yu Gong is in reference to the Chinese deity described in the geographical chapter of the Classic of History, dated 5th century BC. (from History of cartography)
Image 40The Propaganda Map, a 1529 version of the Padrón Real now held by the Vatican Library. (from History of cartography)
Image 41The Mercator 1569 world map (from History of cartography)
Image 42Surviving fragment of the first World Map of Piri Reis (1513) showing parts of the Americas. (from History of cartography)
Image 43Infinitesimal elements on the sphere and a normal cylindrical projection (from Scale (map))
Image 44Blaeu's world map, originally prepared by Joan Blaeu for his Atlas Maior, published in the first book of the Atlas Van Loon (1664) (from History of cartography)
Image 45Scale variation near the equator for the tangent (red) and secant (green) Mercator projections. (from Scale (map))
Image 46A chorochromatic map of world land cover, using hue, value, and saturation to differentiate nominal values (from Cartographic design)
Image 47Map of the “Inhabited Quarter” by Sadiq Isfahani from Jaunpur c.1647. This was one of the only surviving Indian made maps. (from History of cartography)
Image 48The Equal Earth projection (2018), an increasingly popular equal-area pseudocylindrical projection for world maps (from Cartographic design)
Image 49The Salviati Planisphere, a 1526 version of the Padrón Real provided by Charles V to the cardinal who officiated his wedding to Isabella of Portugal. (from History of cartography)
Image 50Map of Biscayne National Park, Florida, using a variety of point symbols, along with line and area symbols. Note the use of coordinated fill and stroke symbols for the national park area to solve the challenge of a water boundary. (from Cartographic design)
Image 513D cartography of Washington State, Mount Rainier National Park, Pinnacle Peak trail. (from Cartographic design)
Image 52A US civil war hachure paper map made in 1867 by Cartographer Nathaniel Michler vs. modern aerial photos over Chancellorsville, Virginia (from History of cartography)
Image 53World map Theatrum Orbis Terrarum by Ortelius (1570) (from History of cartography)

Selected quote

“

And then I went to bed, and went to sleep, and slept soundly, and the next morning I sent for the chief engineer of the War Department (our map-maker), and I told him to put the Philippines on the map of the United States (pointing to a large map on the wall of his office), and there they are, and there they will stay while I am President!

”

— President William McKinley

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Selected biography -

Henricus Martellus Germanus (fl. 1480–1496) was a German cartographer active in Florence between 1480 and 1496. His surviving cartographic work includes manuscripts of Ptolemy's Geographia, manuscripts of Insularium illustratum (a descriptive atlas of island maps), and two world maps which were the first to show a passage around the southern tip of Africa into the Indian Ocean. His world maps summarize geographical knowledge at the outset of the Age of Discovery and "epitomize the best of European cartography at the end of the fifteenth century." (Full article...)

List of selected biographies

Selected picture

Map of the Giza pyramid complex, located 20 km (12.5 mi) southwest of Cairo, Egypt. This Ancient Egyptian necropolis consists of the Great Pyramid, the Pyramid of Khafre, and the Pyramid of Menkaure, along with a number of smaller satellite edifices, known as "queens" pyramids, causeways and valley pyramids, and most noticeably the Great Sphinx. The site has attracted visitors and tourists since classical antiquity, when these Old Kingdom monuments were already over 2,000 years old.

Did you know

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... that Kathryn Maple won the Sunday Times Watercolour Competition twice in three years?
... that Maki Narukido researched the characters' travel times in her manga The End of the World With You using Google Maps?