<p>From very early on, humans longed to know their place in their lands, the world and the universe. The sense of being lost, of ignorance, of darkness must have been strong because humans started making maps of the cosmos, the seas, the lands. Today, maps are made to represent almost everything – subways, roads, the circulatory system, streets, poverty and conflict in the world, etc. In the beginning, maps were half fiction, half fact. They were the two-dimensional representation of landmasses and bodies of water that you’d expect to see, adorned with the local myths, the winds as allegories and the oceans teeming with life under the tutelage of the great Poseidon. No greater metaphor exists than the map; it expresses the search for oneself, for knowledge, for the other, or for something; it places you “somewhere” and defines you and the place. And in the end, you realize that everything is a map, either on paper or in your mind.</p> <p>Here are some of the most important maps ever created.</p>