River landscapes: The origin and development of the printed river map in the Netherlands, 1725–1795

Abstract

River management in the province of Holland in the eighteenth century was co‐ordinated by a Hydraulic Department which worked closely with local, regional and other provincial authorities to maintain river beds and channels. To perform its function efficiently, all the Hydraulic Department's main river maps followed general precepts laid down as early as 1725 by the surveyor Nicolaas Cruquius (1678–1754). The basic principle was to create clear maps with uniform scale and design which contained only the topographical information relevant to the work of the department. Experiments with depth contours were made, and profiles and diagrams were included in order to portray as accurately as possible the invisible natural processes which influenced the river landscape. The cartographical model thus established was followed consistently throughout the eighteenth century.     

Denmark,Norway and Sweden in 1814: a geopolitical and contemporary perspective

1814 is the ‘year of miracles’ in Norwegian history. The transition from Danish to Swedish rule was transformed into a union between a Norwegian kingdom and the Swedish one. Seen in a contemporary and regional perspective, the outcome of 1814 seems less of a Norwegian victory, but even less of a Danish tragedy or a Swedish triumph.

It was a geopolitical and geographical adjustment from one set of imagined ‘natural’ borders – in which Sweden/Finland were tied together by the Baltic Sea, and the Kattegat and the North Sea tied together the Danish composite state from the Danish islands and the Jutland peninsula to Norway and the North Atlantic islands – towards a new definition of ‘natural borders’, in which the Baltic and the Kattegat were the enemy areas. The Scandinavian state system became split between two peninsula states that turned their backs on one another.

Denmark was banished southwards; Sweden gravitated northwards. She was compensated with Norway in a twin union, explained as geographically ‘natural’, held together by the Scandinavian mountain range that had been nature’s own fortification wall for centuries.

The renegotiation processes of ‘natural’ borders in connection with the upheavals in 1814 shows the predominance of politics over nature in region formation. 1814 is, in the Scandinavian region-building history, a manifestation of the political changeability of constructed state borders.     

Encounters with the Levant: the late medieval illustrated Jerusalem Travelogue by Paul Walter von Guglingen

The late medieval illustrated Jerusalem travelogue by the Franciscan friar Paul Walther von Guglingen has heretofore received scant scholarly attention, perhaps owing to the unusual nature of some of its images. Guglingen charts decidedly Islamic spaces with his maps and plan, instead of the conventional sacred shrines of Christianity; these topographical features are interlaced with personal travelling experiences. Illustrations of flora and fauna encountered along the way are the result of careful observation, and meticulous recording. The author experiments with forms to visually represent his own lived experience. In all cases, text and image are closely intertwined and testify that non-religious aspects form a legitimate aspect of this pilgrimage account. Consideration of the illustrations in Guglingen’s Itinerarium, alongside, for example, those in the travelogue of his famous travel companion Bernhard von Breydenbach, allows us to illuminate more facets of the late medieval pilgrimage experience.     

Nicolaas Geelkerken

Abstract

Intelligence work is based on the gathering of information, including cartographic material for preparing new maps. This paper examines copies and re‐editions, produced by British, Egyptian, and PLO military authorities, of topographical maps of Israel on a scale 1:100,000, which were published from the later part of the Mandate (1930s and 1940s), up to the 1980s. Certain features in the copies reflect distinctive political attitudes to the local situation or illustrate a lack of cartographic awareness of their significance. No serious attempts were made to hide the sources of the maps.