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During the opening weekend on 19 and 20 September 2020, you will have the opportunity to be one of the very first visitors to discover the KBR museum. Discover its unique and fascinating collection of manuscripts: the Library of the Dukes of Burgundy.
Read more.

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We forward you the below message from the Commission Chair Imre Demhardt.
Dear Colleagues,
The international situation of Covid-19 remains fluid and the ICA Commission on the History of Cartography sincerely hopes that all its members are making it safely through these challenging times.
While it is still not possible to reschedule our 8th International Symposium (https://history.icaci.org/istanbul-2020/), which was due to be held in Istanbul back in April, a pre-proceedings volume is planned to bridge the gap until we can meet again. Further information on the volume, which just has been accepted by Springer, will be shared.
There is another development of interest to our commission: Because the International Cartographic Association, which in Tokyo in 2019 celebrated its 60th anniversary, feels it is important to lay an institutional focus on the investigation and preservation of its history, the ICA Executive Committee in its most recent (virtual) meeting in June 2020 approved the new Working Group “History of ICA”. As stakeholder for our commission, the Executive Committee endorsed me as one of the members of this Working Group, which will be chaired by Igor Drecki. I hope to share more details with you once the set-up of this WG has been concluded. In the meantime however, it is reassuring that ICA recognizes the need to research and preserve its legacy. To get the ball rolling, I encourage you all to send me comments, questions, suggestions etc., which, if you agree, will go into the new Working Group.
Last but not least, many members of our commission also attend the bi-annual conferences of Imago Mundi. The deadline for submitting an abstract for their 29th conference, which at this point is planned to meet face-to-face in Bucharest in July 2021, is just a month away (October 5). For further details on the conference see the website: https://ichc2021.com/call-for-papers/
Stay strong, take care and best regards
Imre Demhardt
Chair: ICA Commission on the History of Cartography

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Contents:
  • C. Abshire, D. Gusev, S. Stafeyev, M. Wang Enhanced Mathematical Method for Visualizing Ptolemy’s Arabia, 1-25 [pdf 2592 KB]
  • Ε. Voulgarakis, A. Tsorlini, C. Boutoura Depicting the Greek communities in “Smyrna Zone”, Asia Minor at the beginning of 20th century (1919 – 1922), combining historical maps with textual data, 26-43 [pdf 2300 KB]
  • Α. Koussoulakou, M. Dimitriadou, C. Kontozi, Y. Mitzias Telling of a city’s invisible past through georeferenced historical documents and web map technology, 44-56 [pdf 2997 KB]

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Herebelow a message from the ICHC 2021 local organizing team.

Dear Mr. [...],

I’m writing you on behalf of the ICHC 2021 Bucharest organizing team with a kind request. As the pandemic has disrupted most of the traditional channels for academic interaction, we are worried that our CfP has not reached all those interested. Therefore, we kindly ask you to help us disseminate the information to all scholars that share an interest in the history of cartography (especially to those who don’t regularly use H-Map, Facebook, Twitter or similar).

The 29th International Conference on the History of Cartography will be taking place in Bucharest, from the 4th to the 9th of July. The conference is entitled ‘Conflict and Cartography’ and the deadline for submission of proposals is Monday, the 5th of October 2020. All further details are available on the conference website: https://ichc2021.com/call-for-papers/

Thank you for all you help and best wishes,

The ICHC 2021 local organizing team

For further details see here.

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Numerous sessions of the ISHMap 2020 symposium, held online 12 - 13 June 2020, are now available for viewing here. The next issue of Maps in History will include a review of this symposium.

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An article posted on 13 August 2020 by Matthew Edney on his blog entitled Mapping as Process - A blog on the study of mapping processes: production, circulation, and consumption.

It’s time to end a confusing prescription good only for academic gate-keeping. Some years ago, I was in a meeting with a group of colleagues, most of them map historians of long standing, and all good friends (of mine and of each other). In the middle of some discussion, the one younger colleague in the room referred to our field of study as “historical cartography.” Immediately, all the rest of us shared a knowing look and re-asserted our communal superiority. None of us said anything to correct the speaker—that would have been too embarrassing. Rather, we sat secure and self-satisfied that we knew the proper term for the field: “the history of cartography.” To refer to the field as “historical cartography” meant that our young colleague was either intellectually conservative or unable to get with the line with several decades of conceptual change and debate (not the case) or a complete newb.

Read the full text here https://www.mappingasprocess.net/blog/2020/8/13/rehabilitating-historical-map.

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Our Member, Vice-President and Editor of Maps in History, Jean-Louis Renteux, has just published an article entitled Les premières cartes détaillées du Hainaut français [The first detailed maps of French Hainaut].
You will find a complete inventory (on 50 pages) of the cartographic work of French engineers in the territories newly conquered by Louis XIV at the beginning of the 18th century.
These very detailed maps (scale of at least 1:30 000) provide historians with an accurate picture of the landscapes in the vicinity of Valenciennes, Mons, Maubeuge, Avesnes, etc., 300 years ago.
The article appeared in the latest issue of the bulletin of the Commission Historique du Nord which is available from the CHN secretariat (22 rue Saint Bernard, Lille or commissionhistoriquedunord@gmail.com, EUR 25.00 + postage).

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