Chinese Wisdom
Around the same period the Chinese were making similar advancements in mapmaking. During the Song dynasty (960 to 1,279), maps were carved in stone depicting the Chinese coastline with remarkable accuracy.

In 1579, Luo Hongxian published the Guang Yutu atlas. It included more than forty maps, a grid system, and a systematic way of representing major landmarks such as mountains, rivers, roads and borders.

Age of exploration
The birth of the Renaissance and the discovery of the Americas by Europeans revived interest in scientific mapping methods.

Significant figures of this age of exploration include the monk Nicholas Germanus, who in the fifteenth century added the first new maps to Ptolemy's 'Geographica'. And Spanish explorer Juan de la Cosa’s Mappa Mundi of 1500, creator of the first known European cartographic representation of the Americas.

No history of mapmaking would be complete without a mention of Gerardus Mercator, a Flemish cartographer who in 1569 used mathematical formulas in a process now called Mercator’s Projection to create a map that first illustrated the world as we are used to seeing it today. In fact, Mercator’s projection is still the basis used by US scientists to map satellites.

Cartography in the modern age
During the 1900s, the USA experienced great advancements in cartography, with explorers mapping trails while army engineers surveyed government lands. As a result, two agencies were established to provide detailed, large-scale mapping. These agencies exist to this day and are now known as the US Geological Survey and the National Ocean Survey.

In 1884 the Greenwich prime meridian became the international standard reference for cartographers. But it was in the twentieth century that we were truly able to make accurate global maps. Improvements in printing and photography allowed maps to become cheap and commonplace, while aeroplanes made it possible to photograph vast areas.

The Computer Age
The role of technology is intrinsically linked with the development of cartography. While the first maps were manually made with brushes, stone and parchment, they varied in quality to the point no two maps charting the same area were completely identical. Thanks to the invention of the modern compass, printing press, telescope and so on, we can create and reproduce far more accurate maps.

Computers have helped to record, store, sort and arrange vast amounts of data for mapmaking. Specific computer hardware devices allow for scanning, processing and spatial analysis and continue to greatly expand our cartographical abilities. Not only can we map the land, but also the ocean floor and the planets.

You could say mapmaking has come full circle to the earliest recorded aspirations of humanity: to understand the heavens.

Useful links
Babylonian Map of the World
World Map of Hecataeus
Ptolemy’s Map of the World
European Mappa Mundi
World Map made using Mercator Projection