Maps Our Companions 2019

           The skills of observation, thinking and analysis are important for learning this post well. Keep using and refining them.  Maps, information and communication are tools for learning this  post.  Get well acquainted with them. Many things that you have learnt in your  will help you to learn from this post. Do keep them in mind. Wish you all the best !

Learning Outcome :To develop mental and observation skills.

           A Map is a symbolic depiction emphasizing relationships between elements of some space, such as objects, regions, or themes. Many maps are static, fixed to paper or some other durable medium, While others are dynamic or interactive. Although most commonly used to depict geography, maps may represent any space, real or fictional, without regard to context or scale, such as in brain mapping, DNA mapping, or computer network topology mapping. The space being mapped may be two dimensional, such as the surface of the earth, three dimensional, such as the interior of the earth, or even more abstract spaces of any dimension, such as arise in modeling phenomena having many independent variables. Although the earliest maps known are of the heavens, geographic maps of territory have a very long tradition and exist from ancient times. The word (map) comes from the  medieval Latin : Mapp mundi, wherein Mapp meant 'napkin' or 'cloth' and mundi 'the world'. Thus, "map' became a shortened term referring to a two- dimensional representation of the surface of the world.

          A map is a symbolic representation of selected characteristics of a place, usually drawn on a flat surface. Maps present information about the world in a simple, visual way. They teach about the world by showing sizes and shapes of countries, locations of features and distances between places. Maps can show distributions of things over Earth, such as settlement patterns. They can show exact locations of houses and streets in a city neighborhood. Mapmakers, called cartographers, create maps for many different purposes. Vacationers use road maps to plot routes for their trips. Meteorologists - scientists who study weather - use weather maps to prepare forecasts. City planners decide where to put hospitals and park with the help of maps that show land features and how the land is currently being used.

    The land in our environment is not of the same height everywhere. This unevenness gives rise to various land shapes creating different landforms such as mountains, valleys, plateaus, plains and island. For a proper understanding of our environment, it is necessary to study the physical or natural set - up f the land. When we learnt about maps, we saw a 5000 - year - old map. This means that man has felt the needed to make maps since ancient times. At that time, maps were mainly used in wars. While fighting a battle, it is important to have detailed knowledge of the terrain. It helps in working out strategies of defeating the enemy. Maps were very useful for this purpose. Taking into account the differences in their height, shape, etc., various landforms can be shown on a map. There are different methods of showing these landforms on a map.

         The length and width of a landform can be easily shown on a piece of paper. However, the height and depth cannot be shown as easily. There are different methods of showing the elevation or height of the land.

• Contour line method
• Layer tinting method
• Digital elevation model           

Contour line method :This method is used to show the unevenness of landforms on a map. The height of the land is measured from sea-level. Next, points of the same height are identified. Their position is marked accurately on the map. These locations are joined with a line. Such lines are called contour lines.. In the map, lines are drawn, each joining places of a specific height. This way, the relief of the land can be easily shown. It helps us to understand the slope of the land and the height of different places.

     Note that when there is less distance between the contour lines, the slope is steep whereas if the distance is great, the slope is gentle.

Layer tinting method: This method is based on contour lines. In this method, the spaces between contour lines are filled with colour. Each colour indicates a specific height. For example, water bodies are coloured blue, whereas the adjoining land is coloured dark green. Land higher than that is coloured a light green, next higher land is coloured dark green. Land higher than that is coloured a light green, next higher land is coloured   yellow, and so on.

Digital elevation model : This is the most modern method. In this the information obtained through man - made satellites is presented with the help of computers. Maps made using the above methods help us to understand the physical set - up of a region. In other words, they give us an idea of its height, relief and slope, Using computers, we can even find the height of each point on a digital map. Physical maps can be used in military operations, tourism, drawing up mountaineering routes, in making regional development plans, etc.

Do You Know ?

        Nowadays, many modern methods of making maps have been developed, Previously, relief was shown using the 'hill shading' technique.

............................

              Many people use maps. Many components are shown in maps or outline maps. If these components are shown on differed maps in different ways, it will be different to understand them. Therefore, standard sing and symbols are used to make the map easy to read .These symbols and signs are universally used for specific components That is why, everyone can understand them.

Conventional signs : Signs are used to shown various things on a map as per convention. These are in the form of letters or geometrical shapes, for example, lines, Circles, triangles, dots, etc.

Conventional symbols : Symbols are used to show various things on a map as per convention Symbols are miniature drawings of the respective objects For example, temples, mosques, forts, etc.

           The use of signs and symbols in a map helps the reader to get exact information about the places on the map. A list of the things that the signs and symbols represent is given in the key to the map.

Do You Know? The 'Survey of India' is the foremost mapmaking institute in India. It was established in 1767. This institute has made a large number of topographic maps of the Indian subcontinent on various scales by conducting field surveys. These maps are knows the world over for their accuracy. The institute's headquarters are in Dehradun in Uttarakhand.

History Of Mapmaking : Through the ages, maps have taken many different forms. The earliest maps were probably sketches made on the ground that showed the surrounding area. People native to the Marshall Islands used palm fibers to show wave patters between island in the Pacific Ocean. They used seashells to represent islands. Inuit fishermen in the Arctic carved pieces of driftwood to show coastal features. One of the world's oldest existing maps was found on a stone tablet in Spain. It dates back nearly 14,000 years. The ancient Greeks are usually considered the founders of scientific cartography. Greek scholars knew the general size and shape of Earth, and they developed the grid system of latitude and longitude. Eratosthenes, who lived from about 276 to 194 B.C., calculated the size of Earth using mathematics and observations of the sun. Claudius Ptolemaist, or Ptolemy, was an astronomer, mathematician, and geographer in the second century A.D .He brought mapmaking to a level of precision that would not be seen again until the fifteenth century. He combined all his knowledge about the world into a book called Geography.

       In Europe during the Middle Ages, cartographers drew maps reflecting their religious beliefs. These maps were generally simple and sometimes fanciful. The city of Jerusalem, holy to Jews, Christians, and Muslims, was sometimes placed in the center. Many medieval European maps with Jerusalem at the center are called T and O maps. The mass of land was represented as a round wheel encircled with a single round ocean, the ( O ) of the T and O. The land encircled by the oceans was divided by a (T) in to the three continents known by medieval European cartographers : Asia was the large land mass above the T, Africa and Europe were the two smaller sections on either side of the T, and Jerusalem was at the center. The T-shape splitting the continents was composed of the Mediterranean Sea (between Europe and Africa), the Nile River (between Africa and Asia) and the Don River (Between Europe and Asia). The Nile and the Don meet in a single line to form the top of the T. During these Dark Ages in Europe, Arab scholars kept scientific cartography alive. They Preserved the works of Ptolemy and translated them to Arabic. Arab cartographers produced the first reliable globe of the Western world.

         During the Islamic Golden Age, Arab cartographers used complicated mathematical and astronomical formulas to help them determine different map projections. In 1154, the scientist and cartographer al-Idrisi made a map of the a map of the world that was better than the world maps Europeans were producing. Al-Idrisi's map included a representation of the entire continent of Eurasia, including Scandinavian, the Arabian Peninsula, the island of Sri Lanka, and the Black and Caspian Seas. 

      In the fifteenth century, cartography in Europe improved. The development of printing and engraving meant maps that had previously been painted by hand could be copied more quickly. Around the same time, sailors began traveling farther on the oceans, They added newly discovered lands and more detailed coastlines to their maps. Explorers brought back descriptions of the interiors, as well as the coastlines, of continents. Europeans explored much of the Americas during the sixteenth century, Australia in the seventeenth century, and Antarctica was finally sighted in the early nineteenth century. At this point, fairly accurate maps of the entire world were  beginning to be assembled. In the nineteenth century, cartography became more advanced with the development of a printing process called lithography. Lithography allowed cartographers to make many accurate copies of maps with less labor and expense.

          Photography, color printing, and computers all improved mapmaking even more. In just a few decades, the relationship between people and maps changed drastically. For example, instead of using paper street maps, many people navigate using GPS units that communicate with satellites to with satellites to determine their exact location on Earth. Digital versions of maps can represent Earth in three dimensions, defying the limitations of the flat maps of the past. Almost the entire surface of Earth has been mapped with remarkable accuracy, and this information's is available instantly to anyone with an internet connection.

           We will be happy if you share your feelings about the contents of this post with us. We hope you enjoy studying it throughout the time.