Cards are my hobby. I have hundreds of them, but, unfortunately, not a single ancient one. Looking at the collection, every time I think about who was the first to come up with the idea of creating something like this, what considerations guided this person?
Why was there a need for maps?
The answer lies in their purpose - it is the transmission of information about a certain area. Even primitive people depicted on the walls of caves the features of nearby lands: hunting grounds, rivers, reservoirs and mountains. Later, what was seen began to be transferred to papyrus or clay tablets. The oldest geographical map dates back to the 11th century BC. e. and displays deposits of natural stone for the Pharaohs' pyramids. The appearance of maps is a natural phenomenon, because, as civilizations developed, the need arose to record everything that was in the surrounding world.
A Brief History of the Development of Cartography
The map familiar to us appeared in Greece, and Anaximander of Miletus is considered the first cartographer in history. It depicted the Mediterranean Sea and part of its coast, and the role of scale - a unit of measurement of distances - was represented by “days of sailing” and “days of walking”. The appearance of meridians dates back to the 2nd century BC. e. Eratosthenes was the first to draw them; in addition, all his maps had a cylindrical projection, that is, they least of all distorted the real outlines of objects. Another century later, more advanced maps appeared under the authorship of Ptolemy, where a coordinate system was already present. These maps were Columbus's main tool in his voyage. The Great Geographical Discoveries expanded our understanding of the world, and the following appeared on maps:
- Australia;
- Atlantic;
- North and South America;
- Pacific Islands.
But the image was often inaccurate, which turned into disaster for sailors. For example, Bering, in search of the Land of Gama, which simply did not exist, spent almost 3 weeks and did not have time to return before the onset of autumn bad weather. His broken ship with exhausted sailors washed up on a desert island, where the great commander died, and the island received his name.
A person is always driven by curiosity. Thousands of years ago, discoverers, going further and further into unknown lands, created the first semblances of geographical maps, trying to put the relief they saw on sheets of papyrus or clay tablets.
Probably the oldest map found is from the Egyptian Museum in Turin, made on papyrus by order of Pharaoh Ramses IV in 1160 BC. e. This map was used by an expedition that, on the orders of the pharaoh, was looking for stone for construction. The map familiar to our eyes appeared in ancient Greece half a thousand years BC. Anaximander of Miletus is considered the first cartographer to create a map of the world known at that time.
The originals of his maps have not survived, but 50 years later they were restored and improved by another scientist from Miletus, Hecataeus. Scientists have recreated this map based on the descriptions of Hecataeus. It is easy to recognize the Mediterranean and Black Seas and nearby lands. But is it possible to determine distances from it? This requires a scale that was not yet available on ancient maps. For a unit of measurement of length, Hecataeus used “days of sailing” on the sea and “days of marching” on dry land, which, of course, did not add accuracy to the maps.
Ancient geographical maps also had other significant shortcomings. They distorted the image, because a spherical surface cannot be turned onto a plane without distortion. Try to carefully remove the orange peel and press it to the table surface: you won’t be able to do this without tearing. In addition, they did not have a degree grid of parallels and meridians, without which it is impossible to accurately determine the location of the object. Meridians first appeared on the map of Eratosthenes in the 3rd century BC. e., however, they were carried out through different distances. It was not for nothing that Eratosthenes was called the “Father of Geography” as a mathematician among geographers. The scientist not only measured the size of the Earth, but also used a cylindrical projection to depict it on the map. In this projection there is less distortion because the image is transferred from the ball to the cylinder. Modern maps are created in different projections - cylindrical, conical, azimuthal and others.
The most perfect maps of the ancient era are considered to be the geographical maps of Ptolemy, who lived in the 2nd century AD. e. in the Egyptian city of Alexandria. Claudius Ptolemy entered the history of science thanks to two large works: the “Manual of Astronomy” in 13 books and the “Manual of Geography”, which consisted of 8 books. 27 maps were added to the Geography Manual, among them a detailed map of the world. No one created a better one either before Ptolemy or 12 centuries after him! This map already had a degree grid. To create it, Ptolemy determined the geographical coordinates (latitude and longitude) of almost four hundred objects. The scientist determined latitude (distance from the equator in degrees) by the altitude of the Sun at noon using a gnomon, longitude (degree distance from the prime meridian) by the difference in the time of observations of the lunar eclipse from different points.
In medieval Europe, the works of ancient scientists were forgotten, but they were preserved in the Arab world. There, Ptolemy's maps were published in the 15th century and reprinted almost 50 more times! Perhaps it was these maps that helped Columbus on his famous voyage. Ptolemy's authority grew so much that even collections of maps were called "Ptolemies" for a long time. It was only in the 16th century, after the publication of Gerardus Mercator’s Atlas of the World, on the cover of which Atlas was depicted holding the Earth, that collections of maps were called “atlases.”
Geographic maps were also created in Ancient China. Interestingly, the first written mention of a geographical map is not related to geography. In the 3rd century BC. e. The Chinese throne was occupied by the Qin dynasty. A rival in the struggle for power, Crown Prince Dan sent an assassin to the ruler of the dynasty with a map of his lands drawn on silk fabric. The mercenary hid a dagger in a bundle of silk. History tells that the assassination attempt failed.
During the era of the Great Geographical Discoveries, images of America and Australia, the Atlantic and Pacific oceans appeared on world maps. Errors on maps often resulted in tragedy for sailors. Having explored the shores of Alaska, the large Kamchatka expedition of Vitus Bering in the 18th century did not have time to return to Kamchatka by the beginning of the autumn storms. The dreamer Bering spent three weeks of precious time searching for the mapped but non-existent Land of Gama. His sailing ship "St. Peter", broken, with sailors dying of scurvy, landed on a deserted island, where the famous Commander rested forever. “My blood boils every time,” wrote one of Bering’s assistants, “when I remember the shameless deception caused by an error on the map.”
Today, cartography is completely transferred to digital format. To create detailed maps, not only ground-based geodetic instruments are used - theodolite, level, but also airborne laser scanning, satellite navigation, and digital aerial photography.
Illustration: depositphotos.com | Kuzmafoto
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The desire to determine one's location on land, at sea or among the stars was one of the earliest rational needs of man. Primitive drawings of primitive habitats gave rise to a complex and multi-valued line of human activity. Exploration of new lands and their description gave impetus to the intellectual development of the entire civilization.
Cartography is not just a set of methods for visually displaying the earth's surface or the starry sky, it is an effective tool of knowledge that has been improved throughout human history.
Origin of the term
The Greek words χάρτης - chartis (charter, papyrus, paper) and γράφειν - graphene (write, scratch) became the basis of the term denoting a vast area of special professional activity at the intersection of different branches of science related to the description of the spatial human environment. Cartography is also a special field of visual art.
The best examples of handwritten maps from the heritage of past years are masterpieces of graphics of a high artistic level. Today, when creating electronic maps, plans, and diagrams, you also cannot do without artists. In the 21st century, cartography is sophisticated 2D and 3D computer graphics and stylish visual design.
Start
The earliest map-like images that have come down to us relate not only to primitive drawings of the earth's surface, but also to the sky. Petroglyphs (carved on stone) - images of the brightest constellations, were discovered in France and Spain. A rock painting resembling the plan of a village was made 6000 BC in the foothills of Turkey. The history of cartography suggests that it appeared before writing and tells the story of the concentration of all advanced scientific knowledge to create the first cartographic images.
The views of ancient philosophers on the world order were reflected in the first geographical maps, which were drawn in the 6th century BC. e. scientist Anaximander. The earth appeared to them as a flat circle surrounded by water.
Knowledge about the world expanded, and the territory of the planet depicted on maps increased. The development of cartography is difficult to imagine without Ptolemy’s “Geography” (2nd century BC). His maps already have a designation of latitude and longitude, and three parts of the world are indicated: Europe, Asia and Libya (Africa). The most explored areas of Europe and North Africa had a very accurate image, Asia was more conventional. The Unknown Land occupied a large place on Ptolemy's maps.
Maps of Ancient China and the East
The first mentions of Chinese maps, containing, in addition to geographical data, information about the economy of different regions and the goods offered, date back to the 3rd century BC. e. The foundations of cartography, as a fusion of various scientific knowledge - physical, geographical, historical, economic and political - were laid precisely then. Maps and topographic plans in the first centuries of our time already had systems of symbols, rectangular coordinate systems and precise boundaries of lands belonging to the possessions of different rulers.
The achievements of ancient Indian cartographers were reflected in illustrations for the epic poems “Mahabharata” and “Ramayana”. The places where these poems take place contain many mythological elements - legendary cities and imaginary creatures.
On the medieval maps of eastern geographers Al-Khorezmi, Piri Reis and others there are many fantastic and unreal objects, but they also contain areas unknown to European scientists. Among them are the southern tips of America and even the unknown southern continent - Antarctica.
Time of geographical discoveries
The history of cartography consists of several important, revolutionary stages. Such events marked the Renaissance. This was the appearance of the globe of the German geographer, which was called the “Earth Apple,” and the publication of the first collections of geographical maps, the authors of which were Gerhart Mercator and Abraham Ortelius. These atlases had all the features that determined the correct approach to the development and production of maps. Geographic maps were made accessible by the success of printing.
These events were both a consequence and a cause that left no dark spots on the planet. Geography contributed to the emergence of accurate maps; cartography made long ocean voyages and transcontinental land crossings possible. The expeditions of Columbus and Magellan, the travels of Vasco da Gama became possible thanks to the invention of means of navigation by the Sun and stars and the widespread dissemination of accurate and relatively complete images of the studied areas of the earth's surface.
Cartography in Russia
The importance of information about where the borders of states lie, about the location of large natural objects, about deposits of natural resources, has been realized in Rus' since the time of princely civil strife. Geography, topography, and cartography fell into the sphere of special state interests during the formation of the centralized power of Moscow. The result of this attention was the "Big Drawing". It was a plan of Russian territories, made on a sheet of 2.5x2.5 m, created according to one of the versions according to the orders of Ivan the Terrible.
This first known work of Russian cartographers came only in the form of a detailed description - “The Book of the Big Drawing”, from which the great informativeness and thoroughness of the map’s execution were visible.
State approach
Since the time of Peter I, a state system of geodesy and cartography has been formed in Russia. The compilation and printing of maps was placed under the responsibility of the Academy of Sciences. As a result, a huge amount of work was done on state land surveying of Russian territory, and several versions of detailed atlases were released.
Among specialists and amateurs, the Atlas of Central Russian Provinces, compiled and published under the leadership of A. I. Mende, is very famous.
Domestic cartography and geoinformatics were raised to a new technical and organizational level during the Soviet period. By 1954, mapping of the entire country at a scale of 1:100,000 was completed. With active international cooperation, the Great Soviet Atlas of the World was published - one of the most complete cartographic publications in the world.
Modern technologies
Hand-drawn plans and maps of past centuries are objects of fascination for historians, collectors and connoisseurs of graphic art. Modern cartography is a synthesis of advanced scientific achievements and modern technologies. A breakthrough was the active use of remote zoning methods of our planet - first aerial photography, and then scanning the earth's surface using satellites. These tools have made today's maps and plans of various scales unique in their completeness and accuracy.
Computer-aided and electro-optical printing systems have revolutionized the card printing process. 3D modeling, digital analysis and management of huge databases are common methods of work for the modern cartographer. With paper media, it is rapidly decreasing. The main focus of today's cartography and geoinformatics is the visualization of information about the geosphere for electronic media, for viewing on various gadgets.
What does cartography include:
- Cartography is the general study of geographical maps.
- History of cartography - the development of methods for compiling, making and using maps.
- Design and compilation of maps.
- Cartographic semiotics - a system of conventional signs and their use in maps.
- Cartographic design.
- Publishing and publication of maps.
- Use of cartographic materials.
- Development of sources of cartographic information.
- Toponymy is the science of geographical names.
Industry areas of cartography
Modern cartographic products can contain information related to many areas of scientific, social and cultural activity of people. Among them are general geographical ones - the location of objects of natural and artificial origin, geological, soil, ethnographic. New areas include geoecology, geopolitics, and electoral issues.
There are several areas of practical application of such products that have specific requirements for preparation and design. Maps and atlases are actively used in the educational process at various levels of education, in scientific work; they are necessary in maritime and air navigation; maps are an important part of tourist guides. Traditionally, military and engineering maps and topographic plans are in demand.
IT technologies
Computer technologies in cartography have made a real revolution, giving rise to one of its most popular areas. The interaction of computer modeling and geoinformatics gave rise to geoinformation mapping. Its most obvious and distinct result was Internet mapping, which allows a huge number of people to use the necessary and up-to-date information about the surrounding geosphere.
The main advantage of Internet cartography is the relevance of information, its high informativeness and clarity. The ability to update the map online, various options for its display - planar and three-dimensional, day and night, supplementing the map with panoramic photos and video images - all these are means unattainable for cartographers of the past.
On land and in the ocean, on Earth and in space
Without maps it is impossible to explore the world. They carry information collected by specialists from various sources, which helps in its analysis, processing, and the emergence of new theories and hypotheses.
For example, geomorphology - the science of the patterns of formation of the earth's relief - cannot do without accurate topographic maps of the land and seabed. It is impossible to study the spread and causes of epidemics without detailed natural and socio-economic maps.
Even distant planets are becoming the subject of modern cartography. Comparative planetology establishes the patterns of formation of celestial bodies by analyzing maps of the Earth and photographs taken by spacecraft.
Traditions and perspectives
Sometimes there are judgments about the impending death of traditional cartography. Allegedly, the development of information technology will make maps and plans in the form of globes and paper atlases unnecessary. Finding maximum information about any point on our planet or in observable space is becoming easier. But this only speaks about the method of publishing cartographic information.
Cartography has a long history and great traditions. Even though the quality of printing and the merits of the graphic design of maps now concern more collectors, modern information and navigation systems are built on principles developed by many generations of cartographers.
The constant change in the physical, socio-political appearance of the Earth and its environment makes cartography a branch of science and technology, the need for which will never disappear.
For our ancient ancestors, the world was often limited to the land that surrounded and fed them. But even the earliest human civilizations still tried to measure the scale of this world and made the first attempts to draw maps.
The first such map is believed to have been created in Babylon over 2,500 years ago, and it shows the world beyond the Babylonian kingdom as poisonous waters and dangerous islands where (they believed) people could not survive.
Over time, maps gradually became larger in scale as people's knowledge of what lay beyond the Mediterranean grew. With the beginning of the era of wanderings and exploration in the 15th century, the concept of seeing the world changed, the East began to appear on maps, and a huge unexplored ocean appeared in place of America. And with the return of Columbus, maps of the world began to take on a form that was already understandable to us, modern people.
1. The oldest known map of the world is from Babylon (6th century BC). At the center of the world is the Kingdom of Babylon itself. There is a “bitter river” around him. The seven points across the river are islands that cannot be reached.
2. World map of Hecataeus of Miletus (5-6 century BC). Hecataeus divides the world into three parts: Europe, Asia and Libya, located around the Mediterranean Sea. His world is a round disk surrounded by ocean.
3. World map of Posidonius (2nd century BC). This map expands on the early Greek vision of the world, including the conquests of Alexander the Great.
4. World map of Pomponia Mela (43 AD)
5. Ptolemy's world map (150 AD). He was the first to add latitude and longitude lines to the world map.
6. Peitinger Tablet, a 4th-century Roman map showing the road network of the Roman Empire. The full map is very long, showing lands from Iberia to India. In the center of the world, of course, is Rome.
7. Map of the world by Kozma Indicoplov (6th century AD). The world is depicted as a flat rectangle.
8. A later Christian map in the form of a multi-colored clover leaf, compiled by Henry Banting (Germany, 1581). In fact, it does not describe the world, or rather, according to this map, the world is a continuation of the Christian Trinity, and Jerusalem is its center.
9. World map of Mahmud al-Kashgari (11th century). The world is centered around the ancient city of Balasagun, now the territory of Kyrgyzstan. Also included are places (countries) predicted to appear at the end of the world, such as Gog and Magog.
10. Map “Book of Roger” by Al-Idrisi, compiled in 1154. It was created based on information received from Arab traders who traveled around the world. At that time it was the most accurate and extensive map of the world. Europe and Asia are already clearly visible, but so far only the northern part of Africa is visible.
11. Hereford world map of the 14th century by one Richard of Haldingham. Jerusalem in the center, East at the top. The circle in the southern part of the map is the Garden of Eden.
12. Chinese map “Da Ming Hunyi Tu” from the late 14th century. The world through the eyes of the Chinese during the Ming Dynasty. China, of course, dominates, and all of Europe is squeezed into a small space in the west.
13. Genoese map, compiled in 1457 based on descriptions by Niccolò da Conti. This is how Europeans see the world and Asia after the opening of the first trade routes to Mongolia and China.
14. Projection of the globe Erdapfel (“Earth Apple”) by Martin Beheim (Germany, 1492). Erdapfel is the oldest known globe, showing the world as a sphere, but without America - instead there is still a huge ocean.
15. World map of Johann Ruysch, compiled in 1507. One of the first images of the New World.
16. Map by Martin Waldseemüller and Matthias Ringmann from 1507. This was the first map to refer to the New World as "America." America looks like a thin strip of the east coast.
17. World map of Gerard van Schagen 1689. By this time, most of the world has already been mapped, and only small parts of America remain empty.
18. Samuel Dunn's 1794 world map. By charting the discoveries of Captain James Cook, Dunn became the first cartographer to depict our world as accurately as possible.
Why do fortune telling on cards have a magical meaning?
I think that without knowing the history of the creation of maps, it is very difficult to treat them objectively.
What are these pictures? Why do they make a certain sense?
In a previous article about cards, I wrote: “In the process of meditation and astral travel, I learned that cards are deeper, more informative, complex, and emotional than the same “I Ching.”
Let's look at why this is the case.
There are different versions of the appearance of the cards: they were drawn for Charles VI, the French king; they were created by Egyptian priests; their homeland is China and other versions.
Let's figure it out together.
In Europe, maps became known already in 1096-1270. thanks to the crusades in the Muslim East.
And Charles VI lived from 1368. to 1422 That is, cards appeared before him.
It is also known that gypsies brought cards to Europe. They began migrating from India in the 9th century. About 500 years later the gypsies reached central Europe. They carried with them planks tied with rope. These cards were not only covered with writing, but also painted with colorful pictures in order to be understandable to both literate and illiterate people.
As the gypsies spread throughout Europe, so did the maps. There were 78 of them: 22 Major Arcana and 56 Minor Arcana.
Arcanum (Latin arcanum - “secret”; Arabic “rukn” - “pillar, foundation of faith”) is a secret set of information or instructions.
The Minor Arcana became the prototypes of ordinary playing cards. From Ace and Two to King - a modern playing deck. True, in a complete Tarot deck there are Ace, 2 - 10, Page (Messenger), Knight (Warrior), Queen, King. And in a regular deck, the Knight is abolished.
Therefore, we can conclude that the cards were brought from India by the gypsies.
There are no historical sources that would in any indirect way show the export of such knowledge from China.
But in Egypt 5000 years ago lived Hermes Trismegistus, a magician and scientist who compiled the “Book of Thoth.” These were 78 tablets with hieroglyphs. Their symbols - it is a fact - still exist on the wall of one of the Egyptian temples in its underground gallery.
It was a temple where people were initiated into the occult. Each stage of initiation was carried out in a special room, of which there were 22.
On the walls of these rooms there were symbolic paintings, prototypes of which we see on the Major Arcana of the Tarot.
But there are many secrets in the world that are not given to a person to know during his lifetime. Perhaps what I have stated here is wrong.
I relied only on facts. Not on legends and traditions. You be the judge, but in the end everyone believes what they want to believe.
The last question, to which I will answer very briefly and unambiguously, is why each picture has its own meaning and this meaning is almost the same for the same situations, but for different people?
The fact is that each letter, symbol or sign contains all the memory, all the knowledge that was put into this symbol. And the older the sign, the stronger the symbol and the magic of its action. This is why ancient prayers are more effective than praying in your own words. That is why runes, numbers, cards, symbols and even drawn objects will act and show their magic.
After all, letters (which also include runes), numbers, symbols are reservoirs of Divine power, the energy of the Universe, accessible to initiates.
It's so simple and complex, short and precise.
