The principal concern of the history of cartography is
the study of the map in human terms. As mediators
between an inner mental world and an outer physical
world, maps are fundamental tools helping the human
mind make sense of its universe at various scales. More-
over, they are undoubtedly one of the oldest forms of
human communication. There has probably always been
a mapping impulse in human consciousness, and the
mapping experience-involving the cognitive mapping
of space-undoubtedly existed long before the physical
artifacts we now call maps. For many centuries maps
have been employed as literary metaphors and as tools
in analogical thinking. 1 There is thus also a wider history
of how concepts and facts about space have been com-
municated, and the history of the map itself-the phys-
ical artifact-is but one small part of this general history
of communication about space.2 Mapping-like paint-
ing-precedes both written language and systems in-
volving number, and though maps did not become
everyday objects in many areas of the world until the
European Renaissance, there have been relatively few
mapless societies in the world at large. The map is thus
both extremely ancient and extremely widespread; maps
have impinged upon the life, thought, and imagination
of most civilizations that are known through either
archaeological or written records.
Fil: Harley, Jonh Brian. University of Wisconsin in Milwaukee / Wisconsin, United States