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7 of 7 found the following review helpful:
Maps and history inextricably linked Aug 24, 2005
A lot of literature is available about maps but this book claims to be the first to explore the place of maps in history. The title is not entirely accurate, as not all the selected maps made history. Some of them certainly changed the course of events while others merely reflected events. As the author indicates, most maps have not survived through the centuries but the survivors provide a fascinating insight into the past.
Perhaps the map of greatest international interest is the 1783 map of North America, drawn by the British showing the boundaries of the fledgling USA, which at the time comprised only the original thirteen states. The real fascination of this map lies is the various alternative options for the USA-Canada border that are clearly marked. For example, Wisconsin might have been part of Canada while Nova Scotia and southern Ontario might have been part of the USA. There are other aspects of this map that are also interesting but it's clear that the arguments about borders between Britain, France and Spain were long and protracted.
On a completely different level is the local abbey map from several centuries earlier. It is essential a sketch map that would take a few minutes to draw these days but would have required great skill and a lot of time to draw in its time. It divides up the land into various plots, each marked with the name of a tenant farmer.
Two comparatively recent London maps have a historical importance that would not have been foreseen at the time, because they broadened the scope of maps. One is the original 1933 diagrammatic map of the London Underground. Previous maps showing the routes to scale on a normal map had proved unsatisfactory. A electronics circuit expert drew the map as if it were a circuit. He originally drew the map in 1931 but it was considered too revolutionary. Eventually the management reluctantly put it on display to the public to see what they thought. They loved it and so it provided the template for many thousands of similar maps around the world. Although there have been changes since 1933, most of those have been due to changes in the actual map rather than the style. A comparison with the current map will show some stations no longer exist but many others have appeared. The Circle, Victoria and Jubilee lines weren't on the 1933 map although the northern part of the Jubilee is there as a branch of the Bakerloo.
The other important London map is the 1899 map showing social divisions. It is one a series dating back to 1889 in which each street is color-coded according to social class. This map illustrated in stark detail just how much of London was inhabited by people struggling for survival in a way that masses of numerical statistics could never show. So it was that maps became an important statistical tool for population distribution data.
There are many other fascinating maps covering many parts of the world including one map of Australia showing the Great River (which was thought to exist but never did) and various battle maps (the American Civil War, the battles of Waterloo and Culloden among them).
This book shows there is a lot more to maps than just how to get from A to B, but also makes clear how important maps are for that basic purpose.
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