We're very pleased that 3D interactive models of ten of the British Library's historic globes are now freely available online. In fact I haven't stopped spinning them yet. Or is the spinning actually this room I've been stuck in for the past 2 weeks?

Globe viewing can be a rich experience, and some of these globes haven't been looked at properly for a good long while. So for those of you who like a challenge, we invite you to test your knowledge in our mini globe quiz:

• Five globes, three questions each
• Click on the globe title to access the 3D model 
• No prizes (except, obviously, your eternal smugness at getting them all right)
• This site is allowed  
• Answers next week sometime

Good luck!

Willem Janszoon Blaeu's terrestrial globe, 1606 (updated to 1621)

1. Where is the Le Maire strait, sailed through by a Dutchman (unsurprisingly named Le Maire) in 1616 and making a very early appearance on this globe?
2. Who engraved the globe? Clue: he's signed it somewhere.
3. Blaeu's globe pre-dates the introduction of the 'Island of California' on maps by some years, but can you identify another large peninsula which appears as an island here? 

Blaeu's celestial globe of 1603

1. Which late 16th century Dutch expedition first recorded stars in the southern hemisphere, and can you name 3 of these new constellations which appear on this globe?
2. Which famous astronomer was Blaeu’s teacher?
3. Can you spot a supernova? Which constellation is it in?

Thomas Tuttell's celestial globe of 1700

1. Who / what does the constellation Cor Caroli represent, and which modern constellation would it lie in today?
2. Who is the guy in the portrait included in the globe?
3. How did Tuttell meet his tragic end?

Richard Cushee's terrestrial globe of 1730

1. There are two New Britains on the globe. Can you find them?
2. What do all the tiny little arrows refer to, and why might this sort of information be of interest to the globe's viewers in the early 18th century?
3. The Gobi desert is labelled as what on the globe?

Richard Price, terrestrial globe, 1715

1. Where was Richard Price's shop?
2. What collection of desirable commodities can you get from Chile?
3. There's an island in the Atlantic that is way too far north of where it should be. Can you find it?

Everyone loves an old globe. When you see one you tend to want to spin it. Doing so, however, can have hazardous outcomes, and not just for the globes.

  

Charlie Chaplin from the film The Great Dictator (1940).

 

Wiliam Hogarth. Portrait of Captain Thomas Coram (1740). Foundling Museum, London.

Despite the high visibility of historic globes in popular culture, from portraits of sitters with globe attributes through to props in period dramas and comedic devices, today historic globes are curiously elusive things, often locked away and out of sight for their own safety. The British Library’s 150 or so globes are, like all of our maps, available for anybody who has a research need, but we have to be fairly protective over them in order to preserve them for future generations. 

W.J. Blaeu's small table globe of 1606 

So today we are very pleased to be able to launch our highly accessible and hazard-free online web page where for the first time you can view, move and explore 3D models of British Library globes from the comfort of your own home.

Moxon's pocket globe of 1679

Moxon's pocket globe of 1679

Navigate, zoom and spin such highlights as Blaeu’s 1606 terrestrial globe (showing results of the then latest Dutch voyages), the first ‘pocket globe’ (yes, interactive 3D portable maps pre-date the 21^st century!) and some highpoints of 18^th century English globe production. Precisely the sorts of globes that were painted by William Hogarth over two and a half centuries ago. You can investigate the globes further, for example in the 'model inspector' you can see the intricate wireframes used to construct them. You can even switch to virtual reality mode and view them, as it were, in the real world. 

Imaging in progress at the British Library's 3D imaging studio

These are the fruits of a collaboration between the British Library’s Map Library and Digitisation service, digitisation experts Cyreal, and 3D platform Sketchfab. We’re also grateful to historic globe conservator and curator Sylvia Sumira for allowing us to use excerpts from her book ‘The Art and History of Globes’ in the online article.  

Syvia Sumira, 'The Art and History of Globes'.

We hope you enjoy the globes and would love to hear your comments on Twitter at @BMaps.

 Get spinning!

 

We're delighted to host this guest blog from our friends at the Layers of London project.

A satellite image of London alongside one of the RAF aerial images

We are all now accustomed to seeing our houses and their surroundings from above, thanks to easily available satellite images on Google Maps and other websites. In the 1940s though it was quite the novelty, when RAF pilots took to the skies to take over 24,000 aerial images of London, recording the changed face of the city. London was changed forever by the war and these photos show the empty space left by the bombs and the new buildings and roads that were already springing up. The coverage and detail of these photographs was unprecedented and a British Pathé news clip documenting the project tells us that, much like we look up our houses on Google Maps and Street View today, there was an appetite for the new angle among the city’s residents - “any Londoner can buy a photo map of his district which will even show how his back garden is growing.”  

Paternoster Square Bomb Damage 

Since they were taken over 70 years ago these images have always been 24000 isolated snapshots of parts of London. Now though, with the help of the public, they will be stitched together and transformed into a sprawling photographic map of the city which will prove an invaluable insight into postwar London. Layers of London, a website home to more than 200 georeferenced maps of London and 1000s of crowdsourced histories, have now launched the latest pillar of their mission, the Layermaker, where anyone can log in to try their hand at georeferencing one (or one thousand) of these aerial images of London.  Using the same platform as the British Library’s georeferencer, the user friendly tool makes it simple for anyone to contribute to this project.

Booth Map Tracing Tool

The Layers of London project was founded on the principle that history is something to which anyone can contribute and the Layermaker is the latest manifestation of that. Already we have seen the potential of crowdsourcing in the 1000s of records that have been added to Layers of London, with countless photographs and anecdotes that can’t be found in any physical archive but that reflect the rich and diverse history and character of the city. Layers of London has also released the Charles Booth Poverty Map tracing tool in collaboration with LSE Library, using citizen science to gain a deeper understanding of Booth’s endlessly fascinating maps. It is hoped that the Layermaker will meet a similarly enthusiastic reception, helping educate the public about GIS technology and creating an invaluable historic resource.

The Layermaker

The Layermaker is now freely available to use, you can pick images from the 33 boroughs of London. A step by step guide to using it is available here. There will be a launch event on the 19^th of February at Stanford’s book shop in Covent Garden, where we will hear from the Layers of London team and Matthew Bristow of Historic England. If interested in attending make sure to book your place.

You may have noticed some changes to the Georeferencer over the last months. An upgrade has been an essential next step for some time now and the good news is finally here! The completed new Georeferencer is now available. 

All of your old links to maps should still work and you can find further details on the home page. Do get in contact with your thoughts on the new site at [email protected]. I can’t promise that we can make all the suggested changes but it would be fantastic to hear your thoughts. If you are familiar with the old version, the new site should be fairly straightforward but do take a look at our new instructions if you are new to the platform or would like a refresher.

We are looking to have a full relaunch with some exciting new maps later this year but in the meantime there are still more than 8000 Flickr images to go. We do know that some of these images are not maps, this was the result of errors that our mechanical curator made when extracting the maps from the larger collection of Flickr images. We removed a lot of these erroneous images as part of the upgrade, please accept our apologies for those that remain.

Finally, I would like to say a huge thank you to all of our Georeferencers for their hard work. I hope you know that coordinates taken from the Georeferencer already feature in the British Library’s catalogue but you might not be aware of several exciting research applications for Georeferenced maps in the pipeline, the details of which I hope to share soon.

Gethin Rees

Over the centuries the Levant (or the Middle East as we now know it) has received a significant amount of cartographic attention and has featured on countless maps. This isn’t particularly surprising considering the region’s role in trade between Europe and Asia but what makes it rather special is the diversity of cartographical output. Maps of the Levant come in many different styles. As expected, they demonstrate the evolution of geographical knowledge, which gradually improved over time, and there is also an additional aspect of the region’s mapping, very different in content and style of depiction, reflecting the interest in this part of the world from the ancient history and biblical studies points of view. These different approaches were very often merged into one image resulting in an interesting fusion of contemporary and historical geography.  

The first printed map of the region falls into the category of the ancient geography and comes from the edition of Ptolemy’s Cosmographia published in Bologna in 1477.

The first printed map of the Levant. TABVLA 18 from Ptolemaei cosmographaie, Bologna. 1477. (C.3.d.5) 

The depiction is basic and the engraving technique rather crude but let’s not forget that this is the earliest printed atlas issued with engraved maps. It is assumed that the atlas was prepared in haste and the engraver was pressed for time to complete the plates before competitors in Rome had a chance to publish their edition of the Ptolemy’s work.

Detail from TABVLA 18 showing the Eastern Mediterranean with exaggerated Cyprus (C.3.d.5)

 

The Ptolemy’s Cosmographia appeared in numerous editions but even within this genre the geographical representation varied greatly depending on the sources used in the compilation and mapmaker’s interpretation. For example, Sylvanus in his edition of the work (published in 1511) decided to incorporate the contemporary geographical information directly into the Ptolemaic maps in order to demonstrate the geographical discoveries. This method did not find followers and Waldseemüller in his editorial note to the 1513 edition criticised the idea stating that rather than enlighten the readers it confuses them. 

Qvarta Asiae Tabvla from the Sylvanus’ edition of Ptolemy’s Cosmographia published in Venice in 1511 (Maps C.1.d.7.)

 

The second category of the cartographical depiction of the Levant comprises maps produced to illustrate the biblical geography. A prime example is A map shewing ye situation of Paradice and ye country inhabited by ye Patriarchs design’d for the better understanding ye sacred history from the Sacred geography, contained in six maps published in 1716 by Senex and Taylor.

A map shewing ye situation of Paradice and ye country inhabited by ye Patriarchs design’d for the better understanding ye sacred history (118.e.7.)

The map not only shows the location of the terrestrial Paradise, but also includes the position of Sodom and Gomorrah within the Dead Sea waters, the Noah’s Arc as built on the top of Mount Arrat, as well as multiple references to the biblical texts. Alessandro Scaffi’s extended research on the Maps of Paradise was published in his fantastic book well worth reading if interested in the subject.

Detail from A map shewing ye situation of Paradice ... (118.e.7.)

The thematic maps of the Levant in conjunction with the multitude of those produced to express the contemporary geographical knowledge provide a complete picture of the vivid interest the region received from mapmakers through the centuries. 

A New Map of Turkey in Asia by M. D'Anville published in 1794 in London by Laurie and Whittle. Maps * 46970.(2.)

 

Turkey in Asia, drawn from the most respectable authorities by Robert Wilkinson published in 1794 in A General Atlas, being a Collection of Maps of the World and Quarters. (Maps C.10.a.29.)

With maps, as with life, defining something as wrong or right depends entirely on your standpoint. One person’s west is another person’s east, one person’s left is another's right. And vice versa. I think.

You'd think maps would be unequivocal about this sort of thing, but you'd be wrong- in fact there's a whole world of back to front, inside out and the wrong way round in maps. Here are just a few examples.

First, celestial maps, that most confusing of genres. Anyone who has looked closely at a historical celestial globe or chart will notice that in the majority of them the constellations do not match up with how they appear in the night sky. They are reversed. For example, the sword and scabbard of Orion hang to the right of his belt in Thomas Hood’s 1590 celestial chart, but in fact the Orion Nebula is on the left of the constellation as you look at it in the night sky.

deep sky image of the constellation Orion by Mouser, 2004

Deep sky image of Orion                                                            

Detail of the Orion constellation from Thomas Hood's star chart of 1590.

 

Constellation of Orion, from Thomas Hood's 1590 celestial chart

There’s a remarkably good explanation. For much of history the ‘celestial sphere’ was thought to be just that – a vast globe encasing our own globe, with all of the stars and celestial phenomena studded onto it. Since we, the globe viewer, are standing outside of the globe, of course the constellations are reversed. The cases of tiny 17^th and 18^th century pocket globes, with their interiors papered with celestial hemispheres, visualise it very well.   

J.B.Homann's miniature globe of 1700

J.B.Homann, Globus Coelestis / terrestris..., c.1700. 

It all makes perfect sense really, though such maps are pretty useless if you want to use one to locate a star in the night sky.

So much for the quirks of celestial cartography. What about a bit of good old incompetence and blunder? Why not spare a thought for the producer of the first printed map to be included in a Bible, the Zürich Old Testament by Christopher Froschauer of 1525. The map was copied from the famous c. 1515 map of the Holy Land by the German artist Lucas Cranach. But the copyist didn’t think to first create a reversed image of his model before cutting its outlines into a woodblock to print his map from. His finished map shows the Mediterranean Sea positioned weirdly to the east of Israel, not the west.

Lucas Cranach's map of the Holy Land of around 1515

Lucas Cranach the Elder's map of c. 1515 ...

Martin Froschauer's map of the Holy Land from 1525

.. and the unfortunate copy, published in 1525 (Trinity College Library, Cambridge, A.10.18).

Back-to-front issues are everywhere, even in the world famous Hereford Mappamundi of around 1275, where the illuminator apparently got in a muddle and reversed the labels for Europe and Asia.

The Hereford Mappamundi of around 1275.

The Hereford World map, c. 1275  (Hereford Cathedral)

A detail of the Hereford Mappamundi of 1275 showing the letters of Africa over part of southern Europe

...and a detail of the Alps and north Adriatic Sea with the 'R' and 'I' of 'AFRICA' in large gold letters

The sympathetic historian Evelyn Edson described the obvious mortification he must have felt when he realised, ‘and in gold leaf too!’ However, another historian, Marica Milanesi, believed the reverse labelling was entirely intentional in order to follow the late medieval concept of the map as a ‘mirror of reality.’

Milanesi’s argument is persuasive, but there’s no accounting for incompetence.

Today’s commercial pilots are well equipped to detect and fly over or around meteorological obstacles such as thunderstorms that lie in their path, so that as passengers behind we are rarely troubled by them. But imagine if you were flying in an airship of the 1920s instead. We recently added to the BL Collection a map designed for just that – Map showing the frequency of thunderstorms during the month of June on the England-Egypt section of the England-India airship route.

Map showing the frequency of thunderstorms during the month of June on the England-Egypt section of the England-India airship route in 1926.

Maps X.12816.

The map was made at the British War Office in 1926 and is a product of the Imperial Airship Scheme, a Government initiative of the 1920s to create a commercial airship route between Britain and the furthest parts of the Empire. The sheet shows three alternative routes for comparison, concluding that the most western and southerly of the three is the least likely to encounter difficulty.

The thought of negotiating thunderstorms at all in an England-India airship is frankly terrifying, and despite the careful planning evidenced by this sheet, the initiative came to a tragic end when one of the airships designed to fly the route crashed in France on its maiden voyage overseas in 1930.

Far more re-assuring is this recent donation to the BL. The Pilots’ Free Flight Atlas - Eastern Hemisphere, is a colourful collection of topographical mapping of Europe, South-East Asia and the Middle East overlaid with aeronautical information – radio beacons, airspace reservations, waypoints, airfields and runway lengths…

The cover image of 'The Pilots’ Free Flight Atlas - Eastern Hemisphere', 2009.

Maps 2019.a.24.

A number of thematic pages include political maps, a star chart and a sheet entitled Climate/Winds in Europe, North Africa, Middle East showing the main wind directions and strengths in January and in July alongside bar charts giving precipitation and temperature data for selected locations throughout the year.

Detail of a map entitled 'Climate/Winds in Europe, North Africa, Middle East', 2009

Detail of ‘Climate/Winds in Europe, North Africa, Middle East’ Maps 2019.a.24. page 8

Not being an aviation expert I don’t know the frequency with which commercial pilots might turn to this volume in-flight, but as a layman I am re-assured by the detailed information it provides, and the calm and efficient manner in which it is conveyed on backgrounds of natural greens and blues. Not to mention the section on Dos and Don’ts during Thunderstorm Avoidance – ‘Avoiding thunderstorms is the best policy’ remains as true as ever.

 

Nick Dykes

Project Manager, Modern Maps

 

Around the turn of the 20^th century the British War Office in London maintained a library of original, mostly hand-drawn mapping that covered large parts of the world where detailed and reliable surveys were not otherwise available. The maps were gathered from a rich variety of sources including military expeditions, boundary commissions, explorers, travellers, missionaries and spies, and they were used by the War Office for making and revising official printed products.

The maps are now held at the British Library in the 'War Office Archive', and generous funding from Indigo Trust has allowed us to continue cataloguing, conserving and digitising portions relating to Africa, where the archive provides unique details of settlements, populations, communications and land-use immediately before and during the period of European settlement.

Most recently we have digitised maps relating to the former Transvaal Colony, including sheets made during the South African War, also called the Second Boer War. 'Survey of Position Held by Enemy near Belfast. August 1900’ was made in the days following the Battle of Bergendal, the last pitched battle and a turning point in the war. The map is hand-drawn to a high standard, perhaps in anticipation of reproduction and publication, but this appears to be a unique copy.

A map showing the Position held by the enemy near Belfast, South Africa, in August 1900

Detail of 'Survey of Position Held by Enemy near Belfast. August 1900’ WOMAT/AFR/TRA/23

Gun emplacements and rifle pits are shown in red, alongside detailed contour work and rock drawings. Plans and profiles of enemy gun positions are provided around the sides of the map.

A picture of a gun emplacement in South Africa

An image of a gun emplacement

Details of WOMAT/AFR/TRA/23

In a less finished style, but with no less detail, is the following ‘Road Sketch’ from 1906, which shows a 200-mile stretch of the boundary between present-day South Africa and Mozambique. It too is made with an eye on military logistics, and provides details of terrain and road conditions, availability of food and water, and the characteristics and numbers of personnel at forts along the route. All of which provides rich data for present-day researchers.

A map showing the road from Komati Poort To Messangire

Detail of ‘Road Sketch From Komati Poort To Messangire’ WOMAT/AFR/TRA/47

There are now a total of 1,840 map images from the archive available to view on the BL website or to download from Wikimedia, covering large parts of eastern and southern Africa. The catalogue records and images can also be browsed from the geographical search page, shown below.

An image of the geographical search page for the War Office Archive maps

 

Nick Dykes

Project Manager, Modern Maps