The Kangxi Atlas occupies a remarkable place in the history of cartography. During Kangxi’s reign (1661–1722), court scholars produced the Kangxi Atlas. It marked a…
The most important point is that Greek, Chinese, and Indian astronomers were not simply giving different names to the same set of constellations. They organized…
Long before latitude and longitude became the foundation of modern mapping, ancient writers attempted to impose geographic order on an enormous and imperfectly known world.…
Centuries ago, Europeans pictured the Great Wall of China in geographic imagination. Maps did not portray it as a recognizable feature until much later. Travelers’…
Sanborn Fire Insurance Maps are among the most remarkable historical maps ever produced in the United States. At first glance, they may look like ordinary…
When we think of seventeenth-century cartographers, names such as Willem Blaeu, Joan Blaeu, Nicolas Sanson, and John Speed usually come to mind. These men produced…
The Library of Congress website can initially seem overwhelming because it contains millions of digital items across many collections. The key is to begin with…
For anyone fascinated by maps, few online resources are as rewarding as the Library of Congress digital map collections. What was once accessible primarily to…
Maps are often treated as neutral instruments. They measure distances, record boundaries, locate cities, and give us a visual framework for understanding the world. Yet…
Before the advent of color printing, Geographic Information Systems (GIS), and digital publishing, maps owed much of their beauty, and often their usefulness, to the…