A perfect and absolute blank
The Treaty of London gave the eastern half to the Netherlands, creating its curious southern panhandle
Ever since it achieved unification in 1871, Germany craved colonies as a matter of national pride. But by the late nineteenth century, most of the ‘uncivilised world’ was already carved […]
n Not much info on this, the third (*) of former West Berlin’s ten tiny enclaves within former East Germany. This website on Berlin exclaves merely mentions that Laßzinswiesen “was […]
n … then “Jupiter would be revoking democracy in Russia, Saturn would be curling in Canada, Uranus would be trying to figure out how to speak Kalaallisut, Neptune would be […]
n Richard Edes Harrison trained as an architect, but became known as an illustrator for Time (from 1932 onwards) and other national news magazines. His specialty was cartography, applying unusual […]
n n On August 13, 1961, the East German authorities erected a physical barrier in Berlin to prevent their citizens from ‘voting with their’ feet – i.e. fleeing to West […]
n Jack Kerouac was born in Lowell (MA) Jean-Louis Lebris de Kerouac, and in spite of his fancy name, his French-Canadian parents had to emigrate to Massachusetts to find work. […]
n This brilliant map is in a gang of one, for the time being – gastronomic cartography. An intriguing category nonetheless: La France des pains (‘The France of Breads’) visually […]
n This recently unclassified, formerly top secret document released by the Russian State Archives illustrates (quite literally) the lengths the Soviets wanted to go to in order to win the Cold War: not […]
n n n n n At the beginning of the twentieth century, the Ottoman Empire was called the ‘Sick Man of Europe’ because it didn’t seem able to hold on to […]
This blog has been up since September 2006. In that half year, I’ve posted 90 maps, gotten about 1.000 comments – most of them interesting and/or favourable – and just […]
An updated version of the famous United States of Canada vs. Jesusland map (see posting #3 on this blog). That map represented the outcome of the US presidential election in […]
A beautiful map from the time when symbolic cartography was giving way to the Age of Discovery
If the Earth is hollow, where does all that magma spewing out of all those volcanoes come from? Somebody must have a half-convincing answer to that question, presumably that handful […]
“West Floriday, that lovely nation, Free from king and tyranny, Thru’ the world shall be respected, For her true love of Liberty!” So goes a marching song that never got […]
Even one of the world’s most comically small countries can look back on centuries of territorial bigness.
nn n It seems impossible to find an online map showing all of the European Union’s so-called Euroregions. Why doesn’t the EU showcase these transnational regions, conceived to promote economic […]
n Gulliver’s Travels (1726) is a satire of contemporary England dressed up as a faux traveller’s tale by Jonathan Swift, narrating in the first person the voyages of one Lemuel […]
n n This map, made by Mahmud Kashgari bin Husayn bin Muhammad, was included in his Divanu Lügat-it-Türk, a scientific work he published in 1072 (AD) for the benefit of […]
