Pepys Island as a Pacific stepping stone

The struggle to capture islands on early modern maps

Dados Bibliográficos

ID8395681
AutoresKatherine Parker (0009-0005-2568-0879, The Hakluyt Society, autor correspondente)
Ano2018
Volume51
Fascículo4
Páginas659-677
Data de publicação2018-12-01
Peer ReviewedSim
Open AccessSim
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoThe British Journal for the History of Science (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 0007-0874 • E-ISSN: 1474-001X
EditoraCambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1017/s000708741800078x
PMID30566066
OpenAlexW2904109169
IdiomaEN
Citações recebidas3
Referências citadas45

This paper will investigate how geographic features were recorded on maps in the eighteenth century in order to outline the construction of geographic knowledge by British mapmakers. Due to practical and economic factors, early modern cartography was a conservative practice based on source compilation and comparison. For the Pacific region especially, the paucity of first-hand observations and the conflicting nature of those observations rendered the world's largest ocean difficult to chart and prone to the retention of mythical continents, passages and islands. After a discussion of the practical and economic reasons why geographic features were difficult to revise on maps, the article focuses on a case study to show how geographic enigmas could be placed and persist. It will use Pepys Island to illustrate the ways in which a chimeric feature could become instilled in geographic parlance

Cartography · Chart · Geography · Pacific ocean · Geology · History · History of Science and Natural History · Maritime and Coastal Archaeology · Oceanography · Pacific and Southeast Asian Studies