Online Access to Map Collections
Ancient World Mapping Center . (AWMC) is an interdisciplinary research center at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Free maps are arranged geographically. “Since its foundation, AWMC has been engaged in the creation of map content for use both in scholarly publication and in the classroom. As the technology that drives mapmaking continues to advance, AWMC now creates maps using means much different than those of a decade ago. The latest mapmaking application aimed at developing maps for classroom use is the Antiquity À-la-carte application that allows the user to create their own maps.”
Antique and Medieval Atlas. This site contains historical maps of Europe, Africa, and Asia showing political status at the beginning of each century from A.D. 1 to A.D. 1500. This site includes a bibliography.
Atlas of the Middle Ages - Part of Wikimedia Commons Atlas of the World.
David Rumsey Historical Map Collection. The collection focuses on rare 18th and 19th century North American and South American maps and other cartographic materials. Historic maps of the World, Europe, Asia, and Africa are also represented. Collection categories include antique atlas, globe, school geography, maritime chart, state, county, city, pocket, wall, and manuscript maps. Some examples are United States map, maps New York, California map, Arizona map, America map, New York City map, Chicago map, and Colorado map. The collection can be used to study history, genealogy and family history.
Digital Atlas of Roman and Medieval Civilization (DARMC). DARMS "makes freely available on the internet the best available materials for a Geographic Information Systems (GIS) approach to mapping and spatial analysis of the Roman and medieval worlds. DARMC allows innovative spatial and temporal analyses of all aspects of the civilizations of western Eurasia in the first 1500 years of our era, as well as the generation of original maps illustrating differing aspects of ancient and medieval civilization. A work in progress with no claim to definitiveness, it has been built in less than three years by a dedicated team of Harvard undergraduates, graduate students, research scholars and one professor, with some valuable contributions from younger and more senior scholars at other institutions. "
The Digital Atlas of Roman and Medieval Civilizations Version 1.3.1
Images of Early Maps on the Web. "A comprehensive listing of its kind, comprising almost 2,500 annotated free links - updated monthly." This is a Section of Map History / History of Cartography THE Gateway to the Subject, maintained by Tony Campbell (former Map Librarian, British Library, London).
Late Medieval Maps – 1300-1500. Includes: Index of Late Medieval Maps, Monographs, and a Bibliography.
Map History - History of Cartography. Maintained by Tony Campbell (former Map Librarian, British Library, London). The 'Map History' site forms part of the WWW-Virtual Library. It offers many thousands of links to free sites.
Maps and Images (Medieval Source Book). This section of the Sourcebook is devoted to copy-permitted maps and images. These images can be used in teaching, and in web page creation. The source of images is indicated for each image.
Medieval Maps and Images. This section of the Internet History Sourcebooks Project (at Fordham University) is devoted to copy-permitted maps and images. These images can be used in teaching, and in web page creation. The source of images is indicated for each image.
Old Maps Online. Extensive list of links to historical map collections online. From the Perry-Castaneda Library.(University of Texas – Austin) map collection. Allows the user to search for online historical maps across numerous different collections via a geographical search. Search by typing a place-name or by clicking in the map window, and narrow by date.
Old Maps Online. Extensive list of links to historical map collections online. From the Perry-Castaneda Library.(University of Texas – Austin) map collection. Allows the user to search for online historical maps across numerous different collections via a geographical search. Search by typing a place-name or by clicking in the map window, and narrow by date.
Pleiades. Pleiades gives scholars, students, and enthusiasts worldwide the ability to use, create, and share historical geographic information about the ancient world in digital form. At present, Pleiades has extensive coverage for the Greek and Roman world, and is expanding into Ancient Near Eastern, Byzantine, Celtic, and Early Medieval geography.
Regnum Francorum Online - Interactive maps and sources of Late Antique and Early Medieval Europe. "This is a collection of hyperlinks to digitized editions of source-documents and literature concerning early medieval Europe that can be found on the internet today. Sources listed here are all available to the public, free of charge. Currently there are 5764 entries in this collection. Many sources are geo-referenced and can be displayed on the map." (Search strategy: Click on symbols appearing on right-side margin.)
Silk Road Seattle - Maps. “Silk Road Seattle is an ongoing public education project using the "Silk Road" theme to explore cultural interaction across Eurasia from the beginning of the Common Era (A. D.) to the Seventeenth Century. Our principal goal is to provide via the Internet materials for learning and teaching about the Silk Road. Much is available here already: historical texts, well illustrated web pages on historic cities and architecture and on traditional culture of the Central Asian nomads, extensive annotated bibliographies of resources, an electronic atlas, and a stunning virtual art exhibit drawing on museum collections from around the world.”
Atlases
Atlas of the Medieval World by Call Number: Doheny Memorial Library: REFERENCE D117 .M35 2004ISBN: 0195221583Publication Date: New York, N.Y.: Facts on File, Inc.; c1983Forged in an age of faith and war and tempered by great statesmen, religious leaders and artists, medieval civilizations witnessed remarkable transformations. Far from being a homogeneous world of knights and castles, the era saw a multitude of contrasting and often competing cultures, many of which became the foundation stones for the emergence of modern societies. From the expansion of Islam across the Mediterranean to the appearance of centralized states and Christian monarchies, the Atlas of the Medieval World draws from new archival and archaeological evidence to reveal a period of astonishing cultural vibrancy and political diversity. Alongside stunning maps covering nearly a millennium of one of the most formative phases in history, hundreds of exquisite pictures of art and architecture accompany expertly written text edited by Rosamond McKitterick, Professor of Early Medieval History at Cambridge University to bring an extraordinary period to life as no reference has before. The Arab invasions of Europe, the empire of Charlemagne, the African kingdoms of Songhai and Mali, the Crusades, the Viking and Mongol invasions, the Delhi sultanate and the T'ang and Ming empires are just a few of the subjects explained in the Atlas of the Medieval World.
Atlas of Medieval Europe by Call Number: Doheny Memorial Library: CB351 .M293 1983ISBN: 0871961334Publication Date: New York, N.Y.: Facts on File, Inc., c1983Covering a vast and diverse period, this volume provides a fully developed portrait of the Middle Ages -- from the end of the Roman Empire to the discovery of the New World. It is divided into three key sections: -- Geographical/ethnographic background -- Cultural history -- A tour of present-day regions.
Atlas of Medieval Europe by Call Number: Library for International and Public Affairs: G1791 .K6 2000ISBN: 0816044694Publication Date: New York: Checkmark Books, c2000From the Crusades to the War of Roses, this rich historical record is a portrait of the Middle Ages. Once thought a dim passage in the annals of world history, the Middle Ages have come to be recognized as a relevant, illuminating, and progressive period in European history. 190 illustrations, 140 in full color. Full-color maps.
Atlas of Medieval Europe by Call Number: Grand Depository: G1791 .M2 1997ISBN: 0415019230Publication Date: London/New York: Routlege, 1997Covering the period from the fall of the Roman Empire through to the beginnings of the Renaissance, this is an indispensable volume which brings the complex and colourful history of the Middle Ages to life. Key features: * geographical coverage extends to the broadest definition of Europe from the Atlantic coast to the Russian steppes * each map approaches a separate issue or series of events in Medieval history, whilst a commentary locates it in its broader context * as a body, the maps provide a vivid representation of the development of nations, peoples and social structures. With over 140 maps, expert commentaries and an extensive bibliography, this is the essential reference for those who are striving to understand the fundamental issues of this period.
Midddle Eastern Cartography
Lost Maps of the Caliphs by Call Number: Available OnlineISBN: 9780226540887Publication Date: Chicago: The University of Chicago Press; 2018About a millennium ago, in Cairo, an unknown author completed a large and richly illustrated book. In the course of thirty-five chapters, this book guided the reader on a journey from the outermost cosmos and planets to Earth and its lands, islands, features, and inhabitants. This treatise, known as The Book of Curiosities, was unknown to modern scholars until a remarkable manuscript copy surfaced in 2000. Lost Maps of the Caliphs provides the first general overview of The Book of Curiosities and the unique insight it offers into medieval Islamic thought. Opening with an account of the remarkable discovery of the manuscript and its purchase by the Bodleian Library, the authors use The Book of Curiosities to re-evaluate the development of astrology, geography, and cartography in the first four centuries of Islam. Their account assesses the transmission of Late Antique geography to the Islamic world, unearths the logic behind abstract maritime diagrams, and considers the palaces and walls that dominate medieval Islamic plans of towns and ports. (...) Lost Maps of the Caliphs also reconsiders the history of global communication networks at the turn of the previous millennium. It As Lost Maps of the Caliphs makes clear, not only is The Book of Curiosities one of the greatest achievements of medieval mapmaking, it is also a remarkable contribution to the story of Islamic civilization that opens an unexpected window to the medieval Islamic view of the world.
Medieval Islamic Maps by Call Number: Available OnlineISBN: 022612701XPublication Date: Chicago, Illinois/London, England : The University of Chicago Press, 2016Hundreds of exceptional cartographic images are scattered throughout medieval and early modern Arabic, Persian and Turkish manuscript collections. The plethora of copies created around the Islamic world over the course of 8 centuries testifies to the enduring importance of these medieval visions for the Muslim cartographic imagination. Here, historian Karen C. Pinto brings us the first in-depth exploration of medieval Islamic cartography from the mid-10th to the 19th century.
An Eleventh-Century Egyptian Guide to the Universe: The Book of Curiosities by Call Number: Available OnlineISBN: 9004256997Publication Date: Leiden/Boston: Brill, 2014The Book of Curiosities is an eleventh-century Arabic account of the heavens and the Earth, illustrated by remarkable maps and astronomical diagrams. This authoritative edition and translation opens a unique window onto the geographical and astrological knowledge of medieval Islam. An extensive glossary of star-names and seven indices, on birds, animals and other items have been added for easy reference.
The Hereford Mappa Mundi
The Hereford Mappa Mundi. Hereford Cathedral is home to the Hereford Mappa Mundi, one of the world’s unique medieval treasures. Measuring 1.59 x 1.34 metres (5’2” by 4’4”), the map is constructed on a single sheet of vellum (calf skin). Scholars believe it was made around the year 1300 and shows the history, geography and destiny of humanity as it was understood in Christian Europe in the late thirteenth and early fourteenth centuries.
Maps of Medieval Thought: the Hereford paradigm by Call Number: Library for International and Public Affairs: G89.5 .K54 2001ISBN: 0851156029Publication Date: Woodbridge, Suffolk, UK/Rochester, NY, USA: Boydell Press, 2001Previously objects of study for cartographers and geographers, the value of medieval maps to scholars in other fields is now recognised and this book, written from an art historical perspective, illuminates the medieval view of the world represented in a group of maps of c.1300. Thorough examination of literary, visual, oral and textual evidence places the Hereford Mappa Mundi and others like it (such as the Psalter Maps, the Sawley Map, and the Ebstorf Map) within the larger context of medieval art and intellectual history. The Mappa Mundi in Hereford cathedral is at the heart of this study: it has more than 1000 texts and images of geographical subjects, monuments, animals, plants, peoples, biblical sites and incidents, legendary material, historical information and much more; distinctions between real and fantastic are fluid; time and space are telescoped, presenting past, present, and future.
The Hereford Map: : a transcription and translation of the legends with commentary by Call Number: Library for International and Public Affairs: GA304.R5 W47 2001ISBN: 2503510566Publication Date: Turnhout, Belgium: Brepols, 2001The Hereford Map, a depiction of the inhabited world drawn around 1300, is among the largest surviving examples of medieval mappamundi. It measures 1.59 meters by ca. 1.30 meters (52 1/2 inches by c. 52 inches). On it appear some 1,091 inscriptions, or legends; most of these are placed adjacent to a painted figure of what they identify. They range from simple place-names to long descriptions containing historical, ethnographical, theological and zoological information. The book's introduction offers essential background on the Map's history, sources, and scholarship. Particularly important is an explanation of its close relationship to a text recently discovered - Expositio mappe mundi - a work most composed a century before the Map was made. Right-facing pages contain, for each legend: (1) an exact line-for-line transcription, (2) an edited version of this transcription, and (3) an English translation. Left-facing pages offer commentary on each legend, giving information about its literary and cartographical source, the item it identifies, and textual problems. Included in the book is a colour illustration of the entire Map (approximately 40% of its actual size), as well as detail photographs, taken in January 2001 under special conditions, enabling readers to see each legend precisely, as well as to locate all transcribed and translated text. Because of its thorough examination of all aspects of the Map, this book is a tribute to the richest, most complicated surviving example of medieval cartography, as well as an essential tool about medieval culture.
The Hereford World Map: medieval world maps and their context by Call Number: Library for International and Public Affairs: GA304.R5 H47 2006ISBN: 0712347607Publication Date: London: British Library, 2006The famous Hereford world map, the "Mappa Mundi," dates from around 1300, and was painted on one skin of calf-parchment, less than 1 mm thick and measuring about 130 cm square. When we read of its frequent ordeals we may marvel that it is still in good condition and can be examined. Yet it is by no means the oldest surviving mappamundi, nor was it the largest: the Ebstorf map (destroyed by bombing in 1943) was of similar age and almost three times bigger. Mappaemundi may be square or round, large or small, extremely simple or amazingly complex. Their geography is unfamiliar and many of their fauna are grotesque. Their importance is enormous: for their encyclopaedic ambition, for their place in devotional and romanesque iconography and for their attempts to document contemporary world views. In setting the Hereford world map in context, P.D.A. Harvey and his twenty-four collaborators introduce us to medieval ideas of the world and man's place in it, in ways that will excite historians, geographers, students of art history, theologians, and anyone interested in the medieval world view.
Mappa Mundi: the Hereford world map by Call Number: Library for International and Public Affairs: GA304.R5 H37 1996bISBN: 0802009859Publication Date: Toronto/Buffalo: University of Toronto Press, 1996The Hereford Mappa Mundi is the largest and most elaborate world map surviving from before the fifteenth century. Made in the late thirteenth century at Lincoln by one Richard of Holdingham, it was then taken to Hereford, which has been its home ever since. There has been much speculation as to the identity of the author of the map, and the purposes for which it might have been made. More than just a map, it can be seen as an encyclopedia of distant lands, their peoples, myths, and natural history, all held together within a framework of Christian belief - the figure of Christ in judgment is placed in a prominent position at the top of the map. It presents an illuminating view of the world as it appeared to a cultured and well-read person in thirteenth-century England. In this book, P.D.A. Harvey provides an authoritative interpretation of the map, based on a fresh examination of its surface, and reveals evidence of how it was made, what it depicts, and what sources the author used. Many detailed photographs, specially commissioned for the purpose, together with illustrations of other related medieval maps, accompany the text.
Cartography and Culture
- Brill’s New Pauly – Supplement I - Volume 3 : Historical Atlas of the Ancient World byCall Number: Available OnlineThis new atlas of the ancient world illustrates the political, economic, social and cultural developments in the ancient Near East, the Mediterranean world, the Byzantine Empire, the Islamic world and the Holy Roman Empire from the 3rd millennium BC until the 15th century AD.
City and Cosmos: the medieval world in urban form by Call Number: Available OnlineISBN: 1282796194Publication Date: London : Reaktion; c2009In City and Cosmos, Keith D. Lilley argues that the medieval mind considered the city truly a microcosm: much more than a collection of houses, a city also represented a scaled-down version of the very order and organization of the cosmos.
Civitates orbis terrarum = Cities of the world : 363 engravings revolutionize the view of the world : complete edition of the colour plates of 1572-1617 by Call Number: Architecture and Fine Arts Library: G1028 .B7 2008ISBN: 9783822852729Publication Date: Köln: Taschen, c2008Cities frozen in time: a snapshot of urban life, circa 1600 History's most opulent collection of town maps and illustrations The complete reprint of all 363 color plates from Braun and Hogenberg's survey of town maps, city views, and plans of Europe, Africa, Asia and Central America, with dozens of unusual details, two folding maps, as well as selected extracts from the original text and an in-depth commentary. First published in Cologne 1572-1617.
Cultural Atlas of the Renaissance by Call Number: Grand Depository: CB361 .C85 1993ISBN: 0671865234Publication Date: 1993-09-01
Historical Atlas of the Renaissance by Call Number: Doheny Memorial Library: CB361 .R58 2004ISBN: 0816057311Publication Date: New York, NY: Checkmark Books, c2004The Renaissance first bloomed in northern Italy in the 14th century, where the rediscovery of the cultural heritage left by ancient Rome and Greece sparked an intellectual revolution centered on humanism. Lasting for about 300 years, the Renaissance saw notables such as Michelangelo, Dante, Cervantes and Arasmus reshape Europe.
Historic Maritime Maps by Call Number: Available OnlineISBN: 1781608555Publication Date: New York: Parkstone Press International, 2014In the Middle Ages, navigation relied upon a delicate balance between art and science. Whilst respecting the customs and the precautions of their forbearers, sailors had to count on their knowledge of the stars, the winds, the currents, and even of migratory flights. They also used hand-painted maps, which, although certainly summary, were marvellously well-drawn. In following the saga of old sailors, from Eric Le Rouge to Robert Peary, Donald Wigal leads us in discovering the New World. This magnificent overview of maps dating from the 10th to the 18th centuries, often 'primitive' and sometimes difficult to understand, retraces the progress of cartography and shows the incredible courage of men who endeavoured to conquer the seas with tools whose geographical accuracy often left much to be desired.
The King's Two Maps - cartography and culture in thirteenth-century England by Call Number: Available OnlineISBN: 113588496XPublication Date: New York: Routledge, 2004While a culture may have a dominant way of "mapping," its geography is always plural, and there is always competition among conceptions of space. Beginning with this understanding, this book traces the map's early development into an emblem of the state, and charts the social and cultural implications of this phenomenon. This book chronicles the specific technologies, both material and epistemological, by which the map shows itself capable of accessing, organizing, and reorienting a tremendous range of information.
Mappae Mundi: representing the world and its inhabitants in texts, maps, and images in medieval and early modern Europe by Call Number: Doheny Memorial Library, Special Collections: Z109 .M36 2008ISBN: 9781551951874Publication Date: Edmonton, Alberta: University of Alberta, 2008This catalogue showcases some of the treasures of the University of Alberta's Map and Special Collections, as well as other U of A Libraries, particularly in terms of resources to aid in the study of the cultures of Medieval and Early Modern Europe. The curators have focused on "facsimiles," and one of the ways to view the exhibit is in terms of the art of the facsimile, from early twentieth-century black-and-white photographs to twenty-first-century colour, digital photographs on CD-ROM. A second theme is ancient book production, from the papyrus roll through the medieval parchment codex, down to the modern printed book. The curators have also considered representations of the world and its inhabitants: humans in their many activities and occupations, animals wild and tame, and monsters that dwelled in those parts of the world just beyond the boundary of the known.
Mapping Medieval Geographies: geographical encounters in the Latin west and beyond, 300-1600 by Call Number: Library for International and Public Affairs: G89 .M38 2013ISBN: 9781107036918Publication Date: New York: Cambridge University Press, 2013Mapping Medieval Geographies explores the ways in which geographical knowledge, ideas and traditions were formed in Europe during the Middle Ages. Leading scholars reveal the connections between Islamic, Christian, Biblical and Classical geographical traditions from Antiquity to the later Middle Ages and Renaissance. The book is divided into two parts: Part I focuses on the notion of geographical tradition and charts the evolution of celestial and earthly geography in terms of its intellectual, visual and textual representations; whilst Part II explores geographical imaginations; that is to say, those 'imagined geographies' that came into being as a result of everyday spatial and spiritual experience. Bringing together approaches from art, literary studies, intellectual history and historical geography, this pioneering volume will be essential reading for scholars concerned with visual and textual modes of geographical representation and transmission, as well as the spaces and places of knowledge creation and consumption.- Mathematical Geography and Cartography in Islam and their Continuation in the Occident by A 3-volume set.Call Number: Grand Depository: GA3 .S4913 2000Publication Date: Frankfurt am Main: Institute for the History of Arabic-Islamic Science at the Johann Wolfgan Goethe University, 2000-2005
Medieval Maps of the Holy Land by Call Number: Library for International and Public Affairs: G2236.S3 H378 2012ISBN: 9780712358248Publication Date: London: The British Library, 2012This study examines the eight known medieval regional maps of the Holy Land. Interesting, picturesque, and often colorful, these maps provide great insight into how the Holy Land was perceived by Western Europe in the age of the Crusades. Many of the surviving copies and fragments from the period are reproduced here for the first time, including three large maps that are among medieval Europe's finest cartographic monuments. In the course of this study P. D. A. Harvey, a leading historian of medieval maps, undertook detailed detective work that revealed many new discoveries, such as two maps hidden behind newer renditions, a map that was transformed into an erotic fantasy by a nineteenth-century forger, and information about the origin of a mysterious grid pattern on some of the maps. The research and illustrations presented in Medieval Maps of the Holy Land constitute an important contribution to the studies of medieval culture, early mapping, and crusading Europe.- Old European Cities : twenty-four 16th-century city maps and texts from the Civitates orbis byCall Number: Grand Depository: 910.B825t 1955Publication Date: London: Thames & Hudson, 1955?
The Penguin Historical Atlas of the Medieval World by Call Number: Doheny Memorial Library: D117 .J68 2005ISBN: 0141014490Publication Date: London/New York: Penguin, 2005This new historical atlas - richly illustrated with photographs, artwork recreations and full-colour maps - explores the Middle Ages from the coming of the barbarian invasions in the fourth century to the first voyages to the New World in the sixteenth. Coverage of major events - the Hundred Years' War, the Christian Reconquest of Spain - is supplemented by discussion of such key topics as the medieval economy, the growth of towns and the spread of printing, resulting in a rich and multi-faceted introduction to Europe and its neighbours in the Middle Ages.
Terra Incognita by Call Number: Library for International and Public Affairs: GA221 .H53 2008ISBN: 9780226333038Publication Date: Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2008From the age of antiquity to the Middle Ages, scholars argued about the existence of places, and perhaps peoples, beyond the world known to Europeans. But to allow for the possibility of such lands and races raised troubling questions: Was it truly impossible to reach the underside of the earth? And, if so, how could its inhabitants receive the word of God? In Terra Incognita, Alfred Hiatt draws on sources both literary and visual to understand the appeal of the antipodes. Examining maps and diagrams, as well as evidence contained in geographical and historical works, poetry, travel narratives, and legal documents, he challenges long-standing characterizations of medieval spatiality as exclusively symbolic and religious. Instead, Hiatt finds, the idea of people on the other side of the Earth provided a potent and malleable symbol for political theorists, satirists, scholars, and poets--as well as for map makers. Terra Incognita is, in the end, the history of a non-place, of lands conjured by the scientific imagination, which nevertheless drove exploration, and which continued to shape the world map, even as they slowly vanished from it.
The World Map, 1300-1492: the persistence of tradition and transformation by Call Number: Available OnlineISBN: 9780801885891Publication Date: Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press/Sante Fe, N.M.: Published in association with the Center for American Places, 2007In the two centuries before Columbus, mapmaking was transformed. The World Map, 1300-1492 investigates this important, transitional period of mapmaking. Beginning with a 1436 atlas of ten maps produced by Venetian Andrea Bianco, Evelyn Edson uses maps of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries to examine how the discoveries of missionaries and merchants affected the content and configuration of world maps. She finds that both the makers and users of maps struggled with changes brought about by technological innovation--the compass, quadrant, and astrolabe--rediscovery of classical mapmaking approaches, and increased travel. To reconcile the tensions between the conservative and progressive worldviews, mapmakers used a careful blend of the old and the new to depict a world that was changing--and growing--before their eyes. This engaging and informative study reveals how the ingenuity, creativity, and adaptability of these craftsmen helped pave the way for an age of discovery.
