"The East Asian maps presented in this study are all found in the MacLean Collection"--Introduction.

By developing the broadest and most inclusive definition of the term "map" ever adopted in the history of cartography, this inaugural volume of the History of Cartography series has helped redefine the way maps are studied and understood by scholars in a number of disciplines. Volume One addresses the prehistorical and historical mapping traditions of premodern Europe and the Mediterranean world. A substantial introductory essay surveys the historiography and theoretical development of the history of cartography and situates the work of the multi-volume series within this scholarly tradition. Cartographic themes include an emphasis on the spatial-cognitive abilities of Europe's prehistoric peoples and their transmission of cartographic concepts through media such as rock art; the emphasis on mensuration, land surveys, and architectural plans in the cartography of Ancient Egypt and the Near East; the emergence of both theoretical and practical cartographic knowledge in the Greco-Roman world; and the parallel existence of diverse mapping traditions (mappaemundi, portolan charts, local and regional cartography) in the Medieval period. Throughout the volume, a commitment to include cosmographical and celestial maps underscores the inclusive definition of "map" and sets the tone for the breadth of scholarship found in later volumes of the series.

With a multi-perspective approach and transdisciplinary methods (humanities and sciences), this book offers an in-depth and systematic study of hand-drawn and hand-coloured maps from East Asia. Map colouring provides an insight into past societies, landscapes and territories. Colour is an important key to a more precise understanding of the map’s content, purposes and uses; moreover, colours are also an important aspect of a map’s materiality. The material scientific analysis of colourants makes it possible to find out more about maps’ material nature and their production as well as the social, geographical and political context in which they were made. ‘Reading’ colours in this way gives a glimpse into the social lives of mapmakers as well as map users and reveals the complexity of the historical and social context in which maps were produced and how the maps were actually made.

Introduction to Part II - Kären Wigen -- Mapping the City -- 13. Characteristics of Premodern Urban Space - Tamai Tetsuo -- 14. Evolving Cartography of an Ancient Capital - Uesugi Kazuhiro -- 15. Historical Landscapes of Osaka - Uesugi Kazuhiro -- 16. The Urban Landscape of Early Edo in an East Asian Context - Tamai Tetsuo -- 17. Spatial Visions of Status - Ronald P. Toby -- 18. The Social Landscape of Edo - Paul Waley -- 19. What Is a Street? - Mary Elizabeth Berry -- Sacred Sites and Cosmic Visions -- 20. Locating Japan in a Buddhist World - D. Max Moerman

This book documents the relationship and wisdom of Asian cartographers in the Islamic and Chinese worlds before the Europeans arrived.

When European missionaries arrived in East Asia in the sixteenth century, they entered ongoing conversations about cosmology and world geography. Soon after, intellectuals in Ming China, Edo Japan, and Joseon Korea selectively encompassed elements of the late Renaissance worldview, leading to the creation of new artifacts that mitigated old and new knowledge in creative ways. Simultaneously, missionaries and their collaborators transcribed, replicated, and recombined from East Asian artifacts and informed European audiences about the newly discovered lands known as the “Far East.” All these new artifacts enjoyed long afterlives that ensured the continuous remapping of the world in the following decades and centuries. Focusing on artifacts, this expansively illustrated volume tells the story of a meeting of worldviews. Tracing the connections emanating from each artifact, the authors illuminate how every map, globe, or book was shaped by the intellectual, social, and material cultures of East Asia, while connecting multiple global centers of learning and print culture. Crossing both historical and historiographical boundaries reveals how this series of artifacts embody a continuous and globally connected process of mapping the world, rather than a grand encounter between East and West. As such, this book rewrites the narrative surrounding the so-called “Ricci Maps,” which assumes that one Jesuit missionary brought scientific cartography to East Asia by translating and adapting a Renaissance world map. It argues for a revision of that narrative by emphasizing process and connectivity, displacing the European missionary and “his map” as central actors that supposedly bridged a formidable civilizational divide between Europe and China. Rather than a single map authored by a European missionary, a series of materially different artifacts were created as a result of discussions between the Jesuit Matteo Ricci and his Chinese contacts during the last decades of Ming rule. Each of these gave rise to the production of new artifacts that embodied broader intellectual conversations. By presenting eleven original chapters by Asian, European, and American scholars, this work covers an extensive range of artifacts and crosses boundaries between China, Japan, Korea, and the global pathways that connected them to the other end of the Eurasian landmass.