Libby Flaherty, age 12, of Johnson City, Tenn., for her question:
WHEN DID WE HAVE OUR FIRST MAPS?
A map is a graphic portrayal of a part or all of the earth. Maps go back to ancient days. The oldest known map was made about 2300 B.C. It is a small clay tablet from Babylonia that probably shows a man's estate in a mountain lined valley.
As early as 1300 B.C. the Egyptians were making maps. One of the few remaining ancient Egyptian maps shows the route from the Nile Valley to the gold mines of Nubia, part of ancient Ethiopia.
As early as 300 B.C. the Greeks made maps of the inhabited world. They became one of the first peoples to realize that the earth was round. They designed the first projection and developed a longitude and latitude system. Unfortunately, no Greek maps exist today.
The early Romans used maps for taking land and to assist in military campaigns. They were excellent surveyors and were among the first to make road maps. But few of their maps have been preserved.
Claudius Ptolemy, a scholar who lived in Alexandria, Egypt, around A.D. 150, made the most famous of all ancient maps. A map of the world as known at that time and 26 regional maps of Europe, Africa and Asia formed part of his eight book "Geographic." Only a few scholars knew about Ptolemy's maps until the late 1400s, when they were printed in an atlas.
The sailor's chart, or portolano, came into common use during the 1300s and 1400s. It was developed as an aid to navigation along the coasts of the Mediterranean Sea.
Maps of this type were drawn on sheepskin. They showed the outline of coasts and harbors and located shipping ports. The oldest examples of portolano charts date from about 1300. But their fine workmanship indicates they were probably patterned after even earlier maps.
Christopher Columbus was a map maker. As a navigator, he used portolano charts. But as a student of geography, he was also familiar with the maps of scholars.
The growth of knowledge about the world can be traced in maps that were drawn to record discoveries. Almost every voyage of exploration had a chart maker who drew sketch maps of coastlines, harbors and islands. He also drew general maps of each expedition from the sketch maps and the ship's logs.
Later scholars and cartographers added these latest discoveries to their atlases and globes.
The first map to use the name "America" was made in 1507 by a German map maker named Martin Waldseemuller. This was a large world map printed in 12 sheets and measuring about four and a half feet by eight feet. Each sheet was separate, printed from a woodcut and measured about 18 by 24 inches.
One of the greatest map makers of the 1500s was a Flemish geographer who used the Latinized name of Mercator. He not only produced some of the best maps and globes of his time but also developed a map projection of great value to sailors.