Cartography of Africa
Indigenous maps
Whereas most known early maps of Africa were prepared in the framework of the colonial enterprise, some indigenous maps have been recently uncovered, particularly in West Africa and Ethiopia.[1][2]
Earliest European maps
The earliest cartographic depictions of Africa are found in early world maps. In
The only part of Africa well known in antiquity was the
Modern maps
With the European exploration of Africa from the 15th century, maps of Africa became more precise. The Fra Mauro map of 1459 shows a more detailed picture of Africa as a continent, including the Cape of Diab at its southernmost point, reflecting an expedition of 1420. Sebastian Münster's Cosmographia (1545) labels the Cape of Good Hope, reached by Bartolomeu Dias in 1488, as caput bonae spei. The interior of Africa was not mapped in any detail before the second half of the 19th century.
References
- ^ Nyssen et al. 2020.
- ^ Smidt 2003, pp. 688–691.
- ^ Eric Anderson Walker, The Cambridge history of the British Empire, Volume 7, Part 1, 1963, p. 66
Sources
- Nyssen, Jan; Asfaha, Tesfaalem Ghebreyohannes; Meaza, Hailemariam; Dondeyne, S. (2020). "Exploration of a medieval African map (Aksum, Ethiopia) - How do historical maps fit with topography?". Phillippe de Maeyer: liber amicorum. Wachtebeke, Belgium: University Press. pp. 165–178.
- Smidt, W. (2003). "Cartography". Encyclopaedia Aethiopica. Vol. 1. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. pp. 688–691.
Further reading
- Ettinger, Nathalie; Huxley, Elspeth (1973). Africa and Asia: mapping two continents. London: Aldus Books. ISBN 0490002935.
See also
- History of Cartography
- Old World