Anthropology Research Guide: ATLASES & MAPS

The World in Maps, 1400-1600

This exhibition presents many of the most historically significant manuscript maps from the late medieval and early modern period from the Beinecke Library’s vast collection of maps. It is focused on portolan charts - large, colorful charts that showed the shoreline of the Mediterranean, and were used by sailors to navigate from port to port. These maps were crucial to the expansion of European trade in the fifteenth and sixteenth century.

To learn more about the Yale University Library's collection of maps, click here.

From USC Libraries Medieval Studies & Research Guide by Dr. Danielle Mihram & Dr. Melissa Miller

From USC Libraries Medieval Studies & Research Guide by Dr. Danielle Mihram & Dr. Melissa Miller

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.

From USC Libraries Medieval Studies & Research Guide by Dr. Danielle Mihram & Dr. Melissa Miller

Explore the Library of Congress Digitized Collections with Maps!

Browse more than two dozen interdisciplinary digitized collections from the largest library in the world.

Explore "Maps: Online Databases and Collections," curated by MIT Libraries. 

This collection of resources includes regional maps of Boston and New England, as well as resources for the United States and abroad.

Ancient World Mapping Center. (AWMC) is an interdisciplinary research center at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Free maps are arranged geographically. The latest mapmaking application aimed at developing maps for classroom use is the AWMC Interactive prototype 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. 

Digital Atlas of Roman and Medieval Civilization (DARMC).  DARMC "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."

Images of Early Maps on the Web. "A comprehensive listing of its kind, comprising almost 2,500 annotated free links - updated monthly."

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.

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.”

From USC Libraries Medieval Studies & Research Guide by Dr. Danielle Mihram & Dr. Melissa Miller

From USC Libraries Medieval Studies & Research Guide by Dr. Danielle Mihram & Dr. Melissa Miller