5. Describe the history of map-making.
4. Hig
Answers
The history of cartography traces the development of cartography, or mapmaking technology, in human history. Maps have been one of the most important human inventions for millennia, allowing humans to explain and navigate their way through the world. The earliest archaeological maps include cave paintings, to ancient maps of Babylon, Greece, China, and India. In their most simple form maps are two dimensional constructs, however since the age of Classical Greece maps have also been projected onto a three-dimensional sphere known as a globe. In the 21st century, with the onset of Information Age and the subsequent increase in computing power, maps can now be digitized in numerical form, transmitted and updated easily via satellite GPS.
Maps, or depictions that can be identified as geographical representations, have been found across ancient and Bronze Age cultures, with many of these early maps being simple structures that were likely more intended to be used as religious or symbolic tools rather than practical ones. The Classic Greeks in particular developed and expanded the science of Geography and Cartography, with important developments including some of the first attempts to measure the radius of the earth, the development of the first latitude and longitude systems, and the discovery that the earth was spherical, and not a flat disk. (The spherical earth theory has been accepted among the intellectual elite essentially since the 3rd century B.C. and the notion that Europeans thought the earth was flat until the Renaissance is a common misconception.)[1]
Cartographic traditions in Europe declined following the collapse of the Roman Empire in the west, as did the pursuit of many natural sciences. However, despite its decline in Europe during the middle ages, cartography and other geographic sciences flourished in the Middle East and Africa during the Islamic Golden Age, with Islamic scholars making some of the most accurate maps and measurements of the world for the age. Chinese cartography during this time also experienced a peak during the Song Dynasty, where the development of the grid system lead to highly accurate maps for many purposes being produced.
With the rediscovery of classical knowledge in Europe and the Age of Discovery came a renewed interest in cartography and exploration. During this time many growing colonial powers such as Spain, Portugal, and England sought to increase their geographical knowledge for the purposes of domestic prosperity, discovering new trade routes, and securing colonial advantages over their rivals. This period saw the first circumnavigation of the Earth, the advent of the Atlas, the development of the Mercator Projection by German-Flemish geographer Gerardus Mercator, (which was widely used as the standard projection of the earth up until the 20th century, when more accurate projections were formulated.) And perhaps most consequently, the settlement and documentation of the New World (Although, evidence has been found that the Norse Vikings had discovered and attempted to settle North America as early as the first century A.D. However their efforts were unsuccessful and the knowledge of their discoveries was never widely circulated.)[2]
With the exponential increases in technology over the course of the Early Modern Age and the Age of Information, the knowledge of the terrestrial earth has thus increased as well. Modern methods of transportation, the use of surveillance aircraft, and more recently the availability of satellite imagery have made documentation of many areas that were previously inaccessible possible. Services such Google Earth and other free online digital maps has made accurate maps of the world more accessible than ever before.
Answer:
The Greeks and the Romans advanced the science of map making and it was the European from the 15th to 17th centuries who really drove it's development, as they strove to increase their riches and influence over newly discovered areas of the Earth.