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lynn_k's review against another edition
2.0
DNF'd. It is dry, boring, and reads like a textbook. This is coming from someone who has read and enjoyed reading actual textbooks. Not a bad book, just not for me.
earlapvaldez's review against another edition
5.0
Excellent analysis of twelve maps, and with a proper historical treatment (which includes footnotes and suggested studies), this work gives us an idea of how maps are made with particular perspectives and interests (whether conscious or unconscious) in mind. Great way to see also the development of thought, and I'm sure to make use of insights I have gained as I prepare for other important things in the future.
Now, excuse me while I GMaps my way to a nearest Jap restaurant.
Now, excuse me while I GMaps my way to a nearest Jap restaurant.
ratdebibliotheque's review against another edition
3.0
It was quite hard to read and personally I wasn’t quite able to identify the main statement the author wanted to explain in each chapter. It was though a nice challenge to read such a dense book once in a while.
ksoanes's review against another edition
Truly fascinating- the mathematical, scientific, economic, cultural, political, and religious conflicts behind 12 maps throughout history starting with Ptolemy and ending with Google Earth. It several sections it is pretty dense reading. It was a college course in maps contained in a book.
alexandraemjly's review against another edition
adventurous
informative
slow-paced
4.0
Information heavy but well researched and accessibly presented. It combines explanation of how each historical map was significant in it's own time and context but also in the time since.
amphipodgirl's review against another edition
3.0
It’s intelligent and scholarly, but too dry for my. I haven’t finished it, don’t know if I will
nwhyte's review against another edition
4.0
http://nwhyte.livejournal.com/2731983.html
This is the sort of history of science that I very much approve of, taking twelve well-known historical maps and weaving around them the story of how cartography has changed in line with political needs and technological developments.
There are actually thirteen maps discussed in detail rather than twelve (though The Atlantic's review has a good overview of the twelve):
The oldest known map, a cuneiform tablet from Babylon
Ptolemy's Geography
Al-Idrīsī's Tabula Rogeriana
the Hereford Mappamundi
the Korean Kangnido
Martin Waldseemüller's map, the first to use the word "America"
Diogo Ribeiro's world map, which helped Spain to claim the moluccas
Mercator's world map
Blaeu's Atlas
the Cassini dynasty's mapping of France
Halford Mackinder's geopolitical thesis
the Peters Projection
and Google Earth.
It's arguable that this represents only a partial snapshot of the history of the world - geographically, most of these are from within the European/Middle Eastern space, and chronologically three are from the sixteenth century and another two from the centuries immediately before and after. But I think it's legitimate for a London-based Professor of Renaissance Studies to write about what he knows, while pointing out that there are also other times and places which the interested reader can go and find out more about.
Brotton is particularly good at unpicking the ideological choices made by mapmakers at all periods, explaining how the demands of the reader / viewer / customer / patron impact on what is actually shown, and chiseling away at any concept of a perfectly representative map. For those of us who were exposed to the sociology of knowledge at an impressionable age, it's a good bit of re-education. His deconstruction of the more distant cultures in time and space sets him up nicely for brutal dissections of Halford Mackinder and the Peters Projection, and also sets the scene for the last chapter's interrogation of Google Earth. What we see on the map is what the map-maker has chosen to show us - not what is actually there.
This is the sort of history of science that I very much approve of, taking twelve well-known historical maps and weaving around them the story of how cartography has changed in line with political needs and technological developments.
There are actually thirteen maps discussed in detail rather than twelve (though The Atlantic's review has a good overview of the twelve):
The oldest known map, a cuneiform tablet from Babylon
Ptolemy's Geography
Al-Idrīsī's Tabula Rogeriana
the Hereford Mappamundi
the Korean Kangnido
Martin Waldseemüller's map, the first to use the word "America"
Diogo Ribeiro's world map, which helped Spain to claim the moluccas
Mercator's world map
Blaeu's Atlas
the Cassini dynasty's mapping of France
Halford Mackinder's geopolitical thesis
the Peters Projection
and Google Earth.
It's arguable that this represents only a partial snapshot of the history of the world - geographically, most of these are from within the European/Middle Eastern space, and chronologically three are from the sixteenth century and another two from the centuries immediately before and after. But I think it's legitimate for a London-based Professor of Renaissance Studies to write about what he knows, while pointing out that there are also other times and places which the interested reader can go and find out more about.
Brotton is particularly good at unpicking the ideological choices made by mapmakers at all periods, explaining how the demands of the reader / viewer / customer / patron impact on what is actually shown, and chiseling away at any concept of a perfectly representative map. For those of us who were exposed to the sociology of knowledge at an impressionable age, it's a good bit of re-education. His deconstruction of the more distant cultures in time and space sets him up nicely for brutal dissections of Halford Mackinder and the Peters Projection, and also sets the scene for the last chapter's interrogation of Google Earth. What we see on the map is what the map-maker has chosen to show us - not what is actually there.