Malcolm Swanston - How to Draw a Map

COPYRIGHT Copyright Dedication Introduction 1. Lost in Eden 2. Anaximander’s Vision 3. The Legacy of Rome 4. The Road to Paradise 5. Visions of a New World 6. Pre-Columbian Voyages in the Atlantic 7. The First Circumnavigation of the World 8. The English World View 9. Mercator Navigates the World 10. Terra Australis (‘South Land’) 11. Enslaved 12. The Cassinis’ Conceptions 13. The Problem with Empires 14. Gone West 15. A World at War 16. The Second Round 17. Cities 18. Another View of Earth Acknowledgements About the Publisher

HarperCollins Publishers

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First published by HarperCollins Publishers 2019

FIRST EDITION

© Malcolm Swanston and Alexander Swanston 2019

Cover design by Claire Ward © HarperCollins Publishers Ltd 2019

Cover illustration © Neil Gower

A catalogue record of this book is available from the British Library

Malcolm Swanston and Alexander Swanston assert the moral right to be identified as the authors of this work

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Source ISBN: 9780008275792

Ebook Edition © September 2019 ISBN: 9780008275815

Version 2019-10-01

DEDICATION Dedication Introduction 1. Lost in Eden 2. Anaximander’s Vision 3. The Legacy of Rome 4. The Road to Paradise 5. Visions of a New World 6. Pre-Columbian Voyages in the Atlantic 7. The First Circumnavigation of the World 8. The English World View 9. Mercator Navigates the World 10. Terra Australis (‘South Land’) 11. Enslaved 12. The Cassinis’ Conceptions 13. The Problem with Empires 14. Gone West 15. A World at War 16. The Second Round 17. Cities 18. Another View of Earth Acknowledgements About the Publisher

To my wife Heather.

And to Nina, Alexander and Amy.

CONTENTS

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Introduction

1. Lost in Eden

2. Anaximander’s Vision

3. The Legacy of Rome

4. The Road to Paradise

5. Visions of a New World

6. Pre-Columbian Voyages in the Atlantic

7. The First Circumnavigation of the World

8. The English World View

9. Mercator Navigates the World

10. Terra Australis (‘South Land’)

11. Enslaved

12. The Cassinis’ Conceptions

13. The Problem with Empires

14. Gone West

15. A World at War

16. The Second Round

17. Cities

18. Another View of Earth

Acknowledgements

About the Publisher

INTRODUCTION Introduction 1. Lost in Eden 2. Anaximander’s Vision 3. The Legacy of Rome 4. The Road to Paradise 5. Visions of a New World 6. Pre-Columbian Voyages in the Atlantic 7. The First Circumnavigation of the World 8. The English World View 9. Mercator Navigates the World 10. Terra Australis (‘South Land’) 11. Enslaved 12. The Cassinis’ Conceptions 13. The Problem with Empires 14. Gone West 15. A World at War 16. The Second Round 17. Cities 18. Another View of Earth Acknowledgements About the Publisher

In one way or another, we are all mapmakers at heart. I am sure we have an inbuilt urge to understand the world around us and beyond; how do we, or at least our part of the world, fit into the great scheme of things?

Ever since I can remember, I have been completely absorbed in atlases and maps of all kinds. As a child, I received one particular book that enthralled me for years: The History of Our Earth , in which talented artists re-created scenes across double-page spreads of landscapes featuring early dinosaurs, exotic creatures of the desert, human migrations and early civilisations; its well-worn pages are still with me. The moment I first open an atlas, whether it is political, physical, topographical or an historical atlas of any kind on any subject, huge periods of time seem to fly by unaccountably. This affliction has lasted the whole of my lifetime and I appear to have passed it on to one of my children, who is engaged in the production of maps, including the ones used in this book.

My first cartographic undertaking (although I didn’t realise it at the time) was not far from my childhood home, at a milecastle. As the name suggests, these were fortified posts built every Roman mile along Hadrian’s Wall. Interspersed between major forts, these milecastles and smaller turrets contained about 50 men to keep watch, usually out to the north. I would set about measuring the visible remains of ‘my’ castle and working out how its garrison fitted within its walls. My measuring system was a length of rope cunningly adapted to its new use by having a knot tied every yard, and thus I was able to create a five-yard system. Well equipped with a quarter-inch grid in my school notebook, two pencils and a pencil sharpener, and lavishly provisioned with cheese and pickle sandwiches and a bottle of Coke, I set off. I should say we set off, as I had recruited my next-door neighbour and school friend Rob to help (facing the unknown alone was too daunting) – a latter-day Mason and Dixon (see here).

We measured the milecastle at Gilsland, which, in the 1950s, was in the county of Cumberland but is now part of Cumbria; it is still in my memory six decades later. The milecastle is known to modern archaeology as Milecastle 49 at Harrows Scar. It proved to be 19.8 metres (approximately 30 yards) east to west and 22.9 metres (approximately 32 yards) north to south. It is now in the care of English Heritage. Its monument number, if you are interested in such things, is 13987.

Since the River Irthing was not too far away and stocked with trout prepared to present themselves for capture and the frying pan, this was our next port of call and, I suspect, Rob’s real reason for coming along. We succeeded; we came away with the fish and having recorded the edge of the Roman Empire.

My career since then has been almost completely focused on thematic maps – those which display a particular theme, topic or subject of discourse, rather than road maps, with which we are all familiar. Over the course of my life, I have accrued over 50 years of map creation and during these decades cartography has seen the most profound changes, the greatest of which has been technology: the move from physical craftsmanship to the use of computers. Trading the pen, scalpel and scribing tool for software and the mouse marked a significant evolution in the craft of mapmaking.

It seems like a lifetime ago that I received my first fee-paying commission while working for Rolls-Royce Limited. In those far-off days, we cranked up an ancient machine that rejoiced in the name of the ‘Illustromat’. It was originally intended as an aid to technical illustration, used to convert a 2D plan into a 3D angled-view ‘isometric’ illustration. We had discovered that, from a conventional 2D map, we could create a 3D angled view of any chosen part of the earth’s surface.

I was required to create a map of the empire of Alexander the Great, to be featured in a new publication on the famous empire-builder. We taped three maps covering the area of Alexander’s empire carefully together and placed them on the flat bed of the Illustromat. The operator switched on the machine, we selected the angle of the view required, lights flashed and the operator began to trace the coastlines, rivers and details of the area of the empire. As he manipulated the complex settings, veins stood out on his forehead. He began to sweat profusely and I fled the room to return with hot, sweet tea after the initial drawing was completed. Over this drawing were placed several translucent overlays, and on each overlay a different layer of information was created – coastlines, rivers, lakes, type, arrows and symbols. Slowly, a total image of the map was formed. In this particular case, an airbrush base was created showing the land form, mountains, rolling hills and sweeping deserts.