All through the 16th century, several different types of world map projections were created with some configurations that were more distinguished by their artistic eloquence rather than their geographical usefulness. A projection map is a projection of the globe onto a flat map using a grid of lines of latitude and longitude. Guillaume Postel, created a unique woodcut, measuring 120 x 90 centimeters, which combined cartographic and decorative interest. Paris was the first to issue the map, titled ‘Polo Aptata Nova Charta Universi, in 1581 and again in 1589. But, the 1621 issuance is the only surviving copy impression, which is now being preserved by the Bibliotheque Service Historique de la Marine. The Polo Aptata Nove Charta Universi, shows two divided southern hemispheres with reduced-scale quarters and in the top corners, mirror-images. Postel’s map, with its striking decorations and its exquisite and exacting geographical information was a tour-de-force of its time and reveals a strong influence of De Jode of the late 16th century Antwerp school.

In 1691, Moxon, a map seller in England, devised an interesting map that contained not only the terrestrial hemispheres, but celestial as well. Moxon’s family advertised similar maps in a catalogue, stating that these world maps could be bound up with Bibles. In 1671, Moxon’s father, Joseph prepared a set of biblical maps to be combined with Moxons’ that contained a map where the terrestrial hemisphere stretches as far as the equator with the southern sections of America and Africa extending into two of the corners; there are 14 biblical scenes surrounding both hemispheres of Moxon’s more commonly found world map on an oval projection map.

Giovanni Domenico Cassini’s polar projection map of Jupiter is the most celebrated. Giovanni collected astronomical observations of the satellites of Jupiter by the Paris Observatory between the years of 1676 and 1683. Cassini’s map of 1696 was considered the first printed representation of a very large circular map, 8 meters in diameter located on the floor of the Observatory. There were other maps, like the giant de Fer-van Loon double-hemispherical world map of 1694 that also used the Academy’s observations, unfortunately, with Cassini’s maps, which were published in Paris, and despite its importance as a record for scientific geography, there are only 2 copies left, one with the signature of Cassini’s son and the other dating back to 1712.

Polar projection maps are specialised examples of cartographic art, map makers experimented with many kinds of map projections: oval, polar, planispherical and cordiform, but by the 18th century,the maps with a single polar projection became extremely rare due to the popularity of the cylindrical projections and the more widely accepted stereographic projection on two hemispheres.

The More Popular Maps of the Two Polar Projection Hemispheres is a post from: Your Moment is Now

No related posts.