The Library of Congress is proud to celebrate GIS Day on Wednesday, November 13th with a showcase event: In the Shadows of Notre Dame: Geographic Information Science, 3D Mapping and Cultural Heritage Preservation. The all-day series of discussions will be held from 8:30am to 3:30pm in Room LJ-119 on the first floor of the Thomas […]
The title of this post does not refer to the science fiction novel of the same name by Jules Verne. It refers to the phantom island Frisland which was commonly shown on maps of the North Atlantic Ocean during the 16th and 17th centuries. Frisland never existed, however, cartographers believed that the island was real […]
In 1898 Tsarist Russia wrested from China a long-term lease for Port Arthur (Lushun), its new-found warm-water port on the east coast restricted to use by the Russian navy. Under pressure from Great Britain and Germany, two other European powers with concessions in China, Russia agreed to establish an open port on the southern tip […]
Board games have been played around the world for millennia. One of the oldest board games known to exist, named Senet, appears in an Egyptian hieroglyph from about 5,000 years ago! The late 18th century saw a rise in the creation of board games in Europe, many of which were educational, designed to be an […]
Filled with heavy topics of war and occupation, War map: pictorial and propaganda map collection 1900-1950 contains maps and messages that frequently are pointed, unapologetic, and echo the anger and desperation of nations at war. The collection of 180 maps typifies how cartographs were used to influence popular opinion and garner support for military and political efforts […]
The collections of the Library of Congress include thirteen early nautical or portolan charts published between 1320 and 1734. Cartographic historians and map librarians are familiar with these early charts. But what, exactly, is a “portolan” chart? This post will attempt to address a few of the basic ideas revolving around these early nautical charts. […]
Below is an image of the constellation Perseus holding the head of Medusa, famous for her serpentine hair. This chart is from a Russian celestial atlas published in 1829. I became aware of this unusual atlas while searching for new acquisitions for the collections of Geography and Map Division. This led me to learn more […]
Who says you can’t go Baroque from mining? On the contrary, many European regions, states, and principalities owed their prosperity to mining. Among them was the Electorate of Saxony, long a state of the former Holy Roman Empire. Saxony’s Ore Mountains, or Erzgebirge, were particularly blessed with silver, serving as one of its main sources […]
This is a guest post by Kathy Hart, Head of the Research Access and Collection Development Section in the Geography and Map Division. For thematic maps, the map’s margins often contain rich sources of information which supplement the map content. The line separating the map from the information found in its margin is called the […]
Over the years of this writer’s service at the Library of Congress, veterans and their families have sent me questions about maps that show the locations of U.S. forces in Thailand during the Vietnam War. Chief among the reasons that they have sought this information is because some American personnel were exposed to Agent Orange […]