Tag: Maps
Reviewed: The Matteo Ricci World Map
by Michael Yessis | 01.20.10 | 3:39 PM ET
Commissioned in 1602, the Matteo Ricci World Map is the first written in Chinese to show the Americas. It’s currently on display at the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C. Edward Rothstein reviews the exhibition:
Ricci created two earlier versions, beginning in 1584, drawing on atlases and materials he took with him on his journey from Italy. But this third version is the earliest to survive and the first to have combined information from both eastern and western cartography. It is also the oldest surviving map to have given the Chinese a larger vision of the earth.
Even the sturdiest of wall maps tend to have limited life spans, but this large, segmented map is so rare that for centuries it was uncertain if this copy even existed, which is why it has been nicknamed the “impossible black tulip” of maps. It is one of six known copies.
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Yahoo! BuzzMapped: America’s Netflix Rentals
by Eva Holland | 01.11.10 | 1:20 PM ET
The New York Times has mapped the top 10 rentals, zip code by zip code, in 12 major U.S. cities. Jason Kottke ponders: “I wonder if you could predict voting patterns according to where people rent ‘Paul Blart: Mall Cop’ or ‘Frost/Nixon’.”
The World’s Language Density, Mapped
by Eva Holland | 12.22.09 | 3:10 PM ET
Over at Gadling, Aaron Hotfelder’s come across a fascinating Swedish map of the world that shows countries re-sized in proportion to the number of languages they’ve produced. The biggie? Papua New Guinea.
‘Unfordable River Town’ and Other True Place Names
by Eva Holland | 12.14.09 | 12:09 PM ET
The Telegraph has a fantastic slideshow from the Atlas of True Names, a collection of maps that displays alternate place names taken from the literal meanings and early origins of the official nomenclature. The result? Familiar places become “Ferry on the Bank of the Mighty River,” “Market by the Yawning Estuary,” and “Unfordable River Town”—otherwise known as London.
Malaria in post-Civil War America, Mapped
by Eva Holland | 12.08.09 | 1:08 PM ET
We’ve come a long way, haven’t we?
Cartography: A ‘Nether Region Between Science and Art’
by Michael Yessis | 12.02.09 | 4:13 PM ET
More to love from the world of strange maps: Slate has a slideshow and essay about “cartographic curiosities,” courtesy of author Frank Jacobs, whose book of strange maps we blogged awhile back.
Photos: Accidental Geography
by Michael Yessis | 11.24.09 | 1:37 PM ET
Strange Maps just posted another amusing batch of photos where the familiar shapes of continents, countries, states and the like appear in things like shower tiles, cracks in floors, fruit and other random places. Here’s the first batch from last year. (via Coudal’s Fresh Signals)
Senators, Draw Your States!
by Michael Yessis | 11.17.09 | 2:44 PM ET
Love the way National Geographic is celebrating Geography Awareness Week. It invited all U.S. Senators to “draw a map of their home state from memory and to label at least three important places.” The first batch of maps are in, including one from Minnesota’s Al Franken.
Drawing his home state from memory was simple. Remember, this is the guy who can do all 50 from memory in under two minutes.
Travel Movie Watch: ‘Risk’
by Eva Holland | 11.05.09 | 11:13 AM ET
News broke yesterday that a movie version of the classic board game is in the works, with Will Smith as a producer and possible star. Blogger Colin Boyd is excited about the project, but I’m not so sure.
My favorite thing about the game was always the board itself—if you haven’t guessed that I’m a map geek by now, you haven’t been paying attention—but I can’t imagine how a movie would capture that global sweep, the bird’s-eye view of people moving across the continents. I can only hope the producers care enough about that element of the game to try.
The Best Movies of All Time, Mapped
by Eva Holland | 11.03.09 | 4:08 PM ET
Speaking of London Underground-style maps, here’s another good one: Hollywood classics, organized by genre along colored subway lines. Genius.
Mapped: The U.S. Interstates, in the Style of the London Underground Map
by Michael Yessis | 11.03.09 | 10:21 AM ET
See it in Senex Prime’s Flickr stream. (Via Coudal)
How the Waldseemüller Map Changed the Universe
by Michael Yessis | 10.16.09 | 2:43 PM ET
The Waldseemüller map was the first map to identify America, and as Toby Lester writes, it played a great role in Nicholas Copernicus’ argument that the earth revolves around the sun.
Mapped: The Cheeses of Britain and Ireland
by Eva Holland | 10.08.09 | 10:57 AM ET
Another tasty bite of geographical fun—and more proof that British food is worth defending. (Via @LPUSAstaff)
New Travel Book: ‘Strange Maps: An Atlas of Cartographic Curiosities’
by Eva Holland | 10.06.09 | 11:33 AM ET
We know there’s no shortage of odd and innovative maps out there these days—and now, a new book aims to collect some of the best. This “atlas of cartographic curiosities” comes from Frank Jacobs, the author of the Strange Maps blog, and it mixes everything from inaccurate historical maps to satirical cartoon maps, map mash-ups, maps of fictional literary settings and more. Book Bencher Jenna Krajeski calls the book “a peculiar and delightful compiling of disparately obsessive imaginations, selected on the criteria of strangeness, rarity, and originality.”
“Strange Maps” hits bookstores on October 29.
The World’s Connections, Mapped
by Eva Holland | 09.30.09 | 3:30 PM ET
The New Scientist has a fantastic slideshow of world maps, showing global shipping lanes, railways, navigable rivers and more. The idea? To demonstrate how “little of the world’s land can now be thought of as inaccessible.” (Via The Morning News)
McDonald’s in America, Mapped
by Eva Holland | 09.25.09 | 12:59 PM ET
Check out this cool (if slightly disturbing) map of every McD’s location in the lower 48—where, apparently, you’re never more than 107 miles away from the nearest Big Mac.
Al Franken Draws a Map of America
by Eva Holland | 09.09.09 | 1:12 PM ET
From memory. Apparently the good Senator’s been pulling out this party trick for years, but his latest display—presumably, his first since taking office—is drawing a lot of online attention. Here it is, from the Minnesota State Fair:
Hey, wouldn’t it be nifty if an excellent grasp of the country’s geography was a prerequisite for federal office, rather than a viral video-worthy feat?
Mapping Manhattan in 1609
by Eva Holland | 09.03.09 | 12:32 PM ET
Union Square in the early 17th century? According to The Mannahatta Project, an interactive map that lets users search block-by-block for the ecological and wildlife history of Manhattan, it was home to the meadow vole and the white-footed mouse, rather than the Greenmarket browsers of today. (Via Boing Boing)
Book Bannings in America, Mapped
by Eva Holland | 09.01.09 | 1:25 PM ET
Banned Books Week has a mashup of all the book bans (and resulting challenges) in the Lower 48 over the last two years. Anyone expecting a certain, er, geographical censorship concentration might be in for a surprise: Brooklyn and the Bay Area, for instance, are represented right alongside the more stereotypical suspects. (Via The Book Bench)
The Warm Bacon-y Wind of New York City
by Michael Yessis | 08.31.09 | 12:05 PM ET
Jason Logan walked New York City from tip to tip, chronicling the smells of his journey in a fantastic New York Times Op-Art piece. It looked great in print yesterday. Online, it’s better—and interactive. Click on TriBeCa and you’ll find out that while he was there Logan smelled, among other things, deep-fried something, faux-leather fanny pack and a warm bacon-y wind.
There’s great detail throughout. For instance, roll over the map and your cursor turns into a nose.
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