Watch How European Borders Changed since the Middle Ages

This very cool video was found by @BeautifulMaps. It shows how the rise and fall of various states in Europe since the mid-twelfth century

Interactive map of the Roman Empire now online

Imagine you’re in Rome, it’s 205 CE, and you’ve got to figure out the quickest way to transport wheat to Virunum, in what’s now Austria. Your transportation choices are limited: ox cart, mule, ship or by foot, and your budget is tight. What do you do?

Enter ORBIS: The Stanford Geospatial Network Model of the Roman World. With it, you can survey the options that would have been available to an ancient Roman in that very predicament with the ease of getting directions via GPS.


Type in your starting point, destination, the goods you need to move, and the time of year. Voila! You can quickly see the most cost-effective way to transport the grain.

By generating new information about the ancient Roman transport network, ORBIS demonstrates how, more than anything else, the expansion of the empire was a function of cost.

Click here to read this article from History of the Ancient World

Elizabethan Map of America provides clue to ‘Lost Colony’

After decades of unsuccessful searching, archaeologists may have their best evidence ever of the possible fate of Sir Walter Raleigh’s “Lost Colony.” It comes in the form of a clue from Sir Walter himself, secreted within the 425 year old “Virginea Pars” map drawn by his expedition to site the first English colony in the New World.

At a conference held yesterday at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, archaeologists and scholars from the First Colony Foundation and the British Museum discussed the newly discovered information previously hidden within the map and possible implications for understanding the eventual fate of Raleigh’s “lost colonists.”

The “Virginea Pars” map was produced from explorations conducted by members of Sir Walter Raleigh’s Roanoke Colony of 1584-1590. The remarkably-accurate map depicts the coastal area from Chesapeake Bay to Cape Lookout, including the location of many native American villages visited by the colonists. However, until now the map provided little information about the location of his planned “Cittie of Ralegh.”

Click here to read this article from Early Modern England

Earliest medieval map of Britain put online

A fifteen-month research project of the earliest surviving geographically recognizable map of Great Britain, known as the Gough Map, provides some revealing insights into one of the most enigmatic cartographic pieces from the Bodleian collections. The findings are recorded on a newly-launched website.

The fifteen-month AHRC-funded project used an innovative approach that explores the map’s ‘linguistic geographies’, that is the writing used on the map by the scribes who created it, with the aim of offering a re-interpretation of the Gough Map’s origins, provenance, purpose and creation of which so little is known. Although the identity of the map-maker is unknown, it is now possible to reveal that the text on the Gough Map is the work of at least two scribes: the original 14th-century scribe and a 15th-century reviser.

Click here to read this article from Medievalists.net

When Berwick was ‘Barwick’

A detailed map of Berwick from the 17th century has been made available online to celebrate the 400th anniversary of the first atlas of Britain.

The town plan, which is an inset in part of a map of the whole of Northumerland names Berwick as ‘Barwick’.

It was produced by John Speed, who was born in Farmdom, Cheshire in 1551.

Sixty years later his ‘Theatre of the Empire of Great Britaine’ was published, the first time that comprehensive county maps were available in print.

Click here to read this article from the Berwick Advertiser

Mapping the origins of a masterpiece

Published 400 years ago, the first comprehensive atlas of Great Britain is being celebrated by Cambridge University Library, home to one of only five surviving proof sets, all of which differ in their composition.

John Speed’s Theatre of the Empire of Great Britaine is one of the world’s great cartographic treasures. Published in 1611/12, it marked the first time that comprehensive plans of English and Welsh counties and towns were made available in print.

To celebrate its 400th anniversary, Cambridge University Library has digitised each of the proof maps and put them online at www.lib.cam.ac.uk/deptserv/maps/speed.html. The Library is also selling copies of the 60 plus images that make up Speed’s masterpiece.



Click here to read this article from the University of Cambridge

New Mappa Mundi Exhibition at Hereford Cathedral

After three years of planning a new Mappa Mundi exhibition will open at Hereford Cathedral on Monday 4 April. Working in co-operation with cathedral staff a team from Haley Sharpe Design of Leicester has spent the last three weeks removing the old exhibition and installing the new one.

Paying tribute to members of the cathedral staff for their hard work Canon Chris Pullin, the cathedral’s chancellor, said ‘They are a great team. They’ve thrown themselves into this heart and soul. We’ve been very lucky to be working with world-class designers Haley Sharpe, who brought years of experience and flair to the project.’

Click here to read this article from Medievalists.net

Matthew Boyd Goldie awarded fellowship to study medieval geography

Dr. Matthew Boyd Goldie has been awarded a McColl Research Fellowship from the American Geographical Society Library at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. There, he will explore how the British Isles were considered in contrast to other landmasses in the 13th through 15th centuries, as well as the perceived effects of their insularity on their civilizations and cultures.

After traveling from his native New Zealand to Brooklyn College for a Master of Fine Arts, Dr. Matthew Boyd Goldie was already well acquainted with the geography of the earth – at least by modern standards.

Now that has been awarded a McColl Research Fellowship from the American Geographical Society Library at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Goldie intends to deepen his familiarity with the earth’s geography as it was understood by his scholarly ancestors from the Middle Ages. The library, which contains North America’s foremost geography and map collections – some 500,000 maps of all types covering the globe on a range of scales – will provide the ideal setting for the subject of Goldie’s latest research: How were the British Isles thought of in contrast to other landmasses in the 13th through 15th centuries? And what were the perceived effects of their insularity on their civilizations and cultures?

Click here to read this article from Rider University

Call for Papers – The Language of Maps: Communicating through cartography during the Middle Ages and Renaissance

A colloquium and exhibition at the Bodleian Library, University of Oxford

Thursday June 23 to Saturday June 25 2011

Historic maps have broad appeal in contemporary cultures around the world. One reason for this – it might be thought – is because the ‘language of maps’ is universal and straightforward, but is it? How do maps communicate to us? How do they work? This Colloquium seeks to explore these important questions by bringing together scholars whose interest lies in the visual and textual ‘languages’ of manuscript and printed maps from the medieval and Renaissance periods of European history. Original paper contributions on the theme of ‘communicating through cartography’ are sought that will help further our understanding and appreciation of the complexity of medieval and Renaissance maps and map-making. Papers may be theoretical, empirical or methodological in orientation, as long as they address ‘how maps work’.

Click here for more information from Medievalists.net

Hereford Mappa Mundi gets £50,000

Hereford Cathedral’s internationally renowned Mappa Mundi and Chained Library exhibition is to get a ‘make-over’ following the award of a £50,000 grant by the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF) towards a new exhibition and the re-telling of their stories.

The Mappa Mundi is a a medieval map created around 1300, which depicts the known world in a T-O design. It is currently on display in Hereford Cathedral in Hereford, England.

Click here to read this article on Medievalists.net

BBC and British Library look at the history of maps

The BBC and the British Library are collaborating on projects that will explore the history of maps going back to the Middle Ages. BBC Four begins by offering two new series: Maps: Power, Plunder and Possession, and The Beauty of Maps.

Maps: Power, Plunder and Possession, which begins this weekend, is a three-part series presented by Renaissance academic Professor Jerry Brotton, which tells the epic and beautiful story of cartography, from hammered rock art through to the planetary images of Google Earth. The Beauty of Maps is a four-part series, made by Tern Television, which will reveal how a cartographic image is as much about the beauty of its colours, lines, shapes and lettering as it is a geographical tool to aid navigation.

Richard Klein, Controller of BBC Four, says: "Maps, combining artistry, science, history and culture, are a great example of what BBC Four is all about: offering real insight and discourse on a major aspect of our cultural heritage.

"BBC Four continues to be fascinated with the exploration of all things cultural, and maps have contributed to culture in a unique way.

"Beyond their function maps are also fascinating works of art in themselves and through our Maps Moment we hope to go some way towards illustrating their true meaning and beauty."

The Beauty of Maps also has an online counterpart featuring exclusive content thematically aligned to the TV series. Users will be able to explore five historic maps, including the Psalter Map of 1260.

Meanwhile, the British Library will unveil a new exhibit on April 30th entitled Magnificent Maps: Power, Propaganda and Art, where 100 of the greatest maps in the world will go on display over the summer.

Drawn from the 4½ million items held in the British Library's cartographic collections - the greatest map collection in the world - this new exhibition will showcase over 80 of the most impressive wall-maps ever created, dating from 200AD to the present day, most of which have never been seen before.

Recreating the settings in which they would have originally been seen - from the palace to the schoolroom, the exhibition reveals how maps express an enormous variety of differing world views, using size and beauty to convey messages of status and power.

Peter Barber, Head of Map Collections at the British Library, said "Maps are often pictorial encyclopaedias that are about far more than just geography - Magnificent Maps is a visual extravaganza that will, I hope, intrigue, fascinate and entrance visitors while challenging their assumptions about the very nature and purpose of maps."

Click here to go to the British Library website on Magnificent Maps

Click here to go the BBC program The Beauty of Maps

Click here for more information on the BBC program Maps: Power, Plunder and Possession

Sources: BBC, British Library

Jerusalem's Byzantine-era main street unearthed

Archaeologists from the Israeli Antiquities Authority have discovered a 1500-year-old road running through the center of Jerusalem's Old City.

Excavation director Dr. Ofer Sion said the discovery lends further credence to the accuracy of what is known as the Madaba Map - a Byzantine period mosaic map of the Holy Land that depicts an entrance into Jerusalem that leads to a single central street.

This discovery is one of several finds which suggest that the Madaba map was geographically correct.

"It is proof of this beautiful map and for this street from the Byzantine period" Sion told reporters at the dig location.

The ancient road was found near the Jaffa Gate of Jerusalem's Old City 4.5 meters under current street level when municipality workers initiated an infrastructure improvement project.

Dr. Sion, added, “After removing a number of archeological strata, at a depth of 4.5 meters below today’s street level, much to our excitement we discovered the large flagstones that paved the street.”

The flagstones, more than a meter long each, bear cracks from the burden of centuries.

According to Dr. Sion, “It is wonderful to see that David Street, which is teeming with so much life today, actually preserved the route of the noisy street from 1,500 years ago.”

Other artefacts discovered at the site include coins, pottery vessels, and five bronze weights that are believed to have been used by merchants for weighing precious metals.

The Madaba Map (also known as the Madaba Mosaic Map) is part of a floor mosaic in the early Byzantine church of Saint George at Madaba, Jordan. The Madaba Map is the oldest surviving original cartographic depiction of the Holy Land and especially Jerusalem. It dates to the 6th century AD.

Rare 1602 World Map, the First Map in Chinese to Show the Americas, on Display at Library of Congress

A rare, 400-year-old map that displays China at the center of the world will be on exhibit at the Library of Congress from until April 10, before it heads to its intended home at the James Ford Bell Library at the University of Minnesota. The map is on loan from the James Ford Bell Trust.

The Matteo Ricci World Map, the first in Chinese to show the Americas, will be on exhibit for the first time in North America, joining the Library of Congress’ cartographic gem, the 1507 Waldseemüller World Map, in the ongoing exhibition "Exploring the Early Americas." The exhibit is free and open to the public from 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., Monday through Saturday, in the Northwest Pavilion on the second floor of the Thomas Jefferson Building, 10 First St. S.E., Washington, D.C.

After the three-month display, the Library of Congress Geography and Map Division will digitally scan the 1602 document and make the electronic image available to scholars and students for research.

"When the James Ford Bell Trust asked the Library to be the site for unveiling the Ricci map in North America, I was delighted," said Deanna Marcum, associate librarian for Library Services. "The Ricci map, the first map in Chinese to show the Americas, will be placed near the Library’s Waldseemüller Map of 1507, the first document to name America and to depict a separate and full Western Hemisphere. These two maps will ‘talk’ to each other, offering a unique perspective on East-West linkages."

The 1602 map was drawn by Jesuit priest Matteo Ricci (1552-1610), a missionary in China, and measures 5.5 feet tall by 12.5 feet wide. It was designed to be mounted on a folding screen.

The James Ford Bell Trust purchased the map for $1 million from the firm of Bernard J. Shapero, a noted dealer of rare books and maps in London, for the benefit of the James Ford Bell Library.

When the map returns to Minnesota, it will be displayed for a limited time at the Minneapolis Institute of Arts. Afterward it will move to its intended home in the James Ford Bell Library at the University of Minnesota.

Vinland Map is authentic, expert confirms

The 15th century Vinland Map, the first known map to show part of America before explorer Christopher Columbus landed on the continent, is almost certainly genuine, a Danish expert said Friday.

Controversy has swirled around the map since it came to light in the 1950s, many scholars suspecting it was a hoax meant to prove that Vikings were the first Europeans to land in North America -- a claim confirmed by a 1960 archaeological find.



Doubts about the map lingered even after the use of carbon dating as a way of establishing the age of an object.

"All the tests that we have done over the past five years -- on the materials and other aspects -- do not show any signs of forgery," Rene Larsen, rector of the School of Conservation under the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts.

He presented his team's findings at the 23rd International Conference on the History of Cartography in Copenhagen on Friday. His paper was entitled,'Facts and Myths about the Vinland Map and its Context'.

The map shows both Greenland and a western Atlantic island "Vinilanda Insula," the Vinland of the Icelandic sagas, now linked by scholars to Newfoundland where Norsemen under Leif Eriksson settled around AD 1000.

Larsen said his team carried out studies of the ink, writing, wormholes and parchment of the map, which is housed at Yale University in the United States.

He said wormholes, caused by wood beetles, were consistent with wormholes in the books with which the map was bound.

He said claims the ink was too recent because it contained a substance called anatase titanium dioxide could be rejected because medieval maps have been found with the same substance, which probably came from sand used to dry wet ink.

American scholars have carbon dated the map to about 1440, about 50 years before Columbus "discovered" the New World in 1492. Scholars believe it was produced for a 1440 church council at Basel, Switzerland.

The Vinland Map is not a "Viking map" and does not alter the historical understanding of who first sailed to North America. But if it is genuine, it shows that the New World was known not only to Norsemen but also to other Europeans at least half a century before Columbus's voyage.

It was bought from a Swiss dealer by an American after the British Museum turned it down in 1957. It was subsequently bought for Yale University by a wealthy Yale alumnus, Paul Mellon, and published with fanfare in 1965.

The lack of a provenance has caused much of the controversy. Where the map came from and how it came into the hands of the Swiss dealer after World War Two remain a mystery.