Reading matter (about map collecting and general introductions to the subject)
Print:
See if you can buy one of the titles listed in Books to get you into the
subject, or track them down in your local library - for collecting, try Francis J.
Manasek's Collecting old maps or Jonathan Potter's Collecting antique maps. For
lists of relevant publications and catalogues, see General Bibliographies
, which includes a few entries for specific areas or themes.
'Anatomy of a
collection' (reissue of an illustrated article by Rodney Shirley in The Map Collector 67 (Summer 1994);
about the principles behind collecting, in this case cartographic title-pages - Kunstpedia)
Geography and Maps: an Illustrated Guide
('Introduction' by Ralph Ehrenberg, featuring illustrated sections on Atlases, Special Collections, General Collections, Globes
and Terrain Models, Aerial Photographs and Remote Sensing Images, Digital Data and Geographic Information Systems, List of Special
Collections; and a list of the many map images used - Library of Congress, Geography and Map Division)
History of Cartography
(a succession of pages, each with illustrations [click on each for more details] apparently without a contents page -
Bibliothèque nationale de France)
'The
history of cartography' by J J O'Connor and E F Robertson, from the 'MacTutor History of
Mathematics' archive (with an emphasis on the scientific aspects)
HistoryWorld offers 13 short,
unsigned and unreferenced sections, linked to other encyclopaedia entries [search on map
for 'Maps: tour through time']
'Lighting Out for the Territory' (a miscellany about map dealers and collectors (mostly in
the US) by Dan Hofstadter for Art & Antiques, December 2009)
'Maps'
(historical essay (broken into short sections), assisting students to understand early maps, by Joni Seager,
University of Vermont, for 'History Matters', George Mason University)
'Maps: What I
Collect and Why' (by Glen McLaughlin, et al. - Occasional Paper 11 of the California Map
Society, 2012, with an associated Gallery of high resolution images, courtesy of Stanford University Libraries)
The bi-monthly Mercator's World [which ceased publication in 2003] also made some of its
material available online. The links have been restored to this site via the Wayback Machine (February 2006).
The Old Map Gallery's Tips for Collectors (much of the text is taken from Antique Map Price
Record & Handbook)
Old World Auctions - see the periodical issues of their online Newsletter (eight times a year, from August 2013,
with brief but informative notes on aspects of map collecting)
Patricia Seed's Latitude has brief notes,
designed for students, on aspects of late medieval and Renaissance
navigation (e.g. latitude/longitude, ships, currents, weather, etc) to
help you understand the voyages of Columbus and the other early discoverers
’Tutorial: History of Cartography’ (an illustrated summary - jointly-authored and available
also in the various EU languages, Chinese, Russian and Turkish)
'Understanding engraved maps' (reissue of a 1989 illustrated article by Tony
Campbell in The Map Collector, explaining the basic rules of cartobibliography)
University of Texas at Arlington's Cartographic Connections site
includes brief introductory texts: 'What is a map?'; 'Anatomy of a map'; and
'Deciphering a map'
‘World History Sources: Maps' is illustrated with early maps and with sections on
(e.g.) ‘What can maps tell us?’, ‘What choices did the mapmaker make?’ - from an author whose
research interests are in 'feminist geography, environmental policy, and global political
economy'; this can be downloaded as a single, 22-page pdf essay (a
project of the Center for History and New Media, George Mason University, by Joni Seager',
University of Vermont)
Map Bar
The map dealer Paulus Swaen has created a ‘Map Bar’, ‘where
collectors can invite friends and colleagues to view and enjoy their maps in a virtual 3-dimensional space’. On this see
also the IMCoS Map Journal, 170 (September 2022), p.40.
Visit a local map dealer, or attend a map fair, so that you can see some original
maps. The 'Web Images' page includes a section on Larger map dealer sites
. Use those links to locate pictures of maps of a particular region, or search out those by a
specific maker. This is also a way to find out something about an individual item, although the
descriptions may be rudimentary. You can also learn about prices from those sites. Look at Joel
Kovarsky's Book search engines
on the web: use for map-related materials.
For a round-up, see Marketplace, which
also has sections on map fairs and auctions.
Conservation
See, for brief and clear notes from a knowledgeable map dealer Joel Kovarsky's 'Care of old maps'. Also specifically on this
topic, from the British Museum's celebrated former Conservator, A.D. Baynes-Cope, is 'The conservation of maps' (LIBER Bulletin
12 (1978)).
The British Library's Preservation Advisory Centre has put online a range of publications, including Cleaning books and documents.
Another place to look is the American Institute for Conservation of Historic and Artistic Works,
particularly at the pages for Caring for your books and Caring for your
documents and art on paper. The website of the Groupe des Cartothécaires de LIBER reprints a number
of articles on Conservation from
1978 onwards.
Take a look at the Northeast Document Conservation Center's online leaflets on a wide variety of Preservation and Conservation topics.
The well-publicised story of Unravelling the ‘Chimney
map’ is well described in a YouTube video. This shows the fragmentary condition of the large double-hemisphere map of
the world, Nova totius terrarum orbis tabula, by Gerard Valck and Leonard Schenk (Amsterdam, c.1690), discovered up a
chimney of a house in northeast Scotland in 2008 and delivered in a plastic bag in pieces, and its miraculous
transformation. See also a second YouTube video).
See the 4-minute YouTube video about restoration of the large and badly damaged plan of Evanston by Theodore Reese (c.1876), 'Library Restores
and Digitizes Oldest Known Map of Evanston'.
Another case study is 'Solving the Ptolemy Puzzle' (about the conservation issues raised by the Library of Congress's
1513 Ptolemy, by Sylvia Albro et al., The Book and Paper Group Annual 30 (2001): 5-8).
For UK suppliers of conservation materials see the British Cartographic Society's 'MCG Toolbox' under 'Equipment and supplies'.
Besides the links above, see also under 'Map Societies' below and, for topics such as paper and watermarks, the Bibliography section of the 'Special Topics' page.
There is also an Internet list: Roadmaps-L and two societies: Road Map Collectors Association; and Association des Collectionneurs de Guides et
Cartes Michelin [contact Denis Rivière: DENIS-RIVIERE(at)wanadoo.fr (NB. You need to replace
(at) with the @ symbol)].
Pascal Pannetier runs a quarterly print journal, Route Nostalgie. For
other information on road maps see under 'roads' on the 'Themes'
page of 'Web Articles'. For images of road maps, see 'Web Images',
select the appropriate geographical heading, and search [Ctrl+F] for 'roads'.
