Mystical Maps

I wanted to highlight this really intriguing fan-like arc map design (above). The actual map is called the Mao Kun Map, taken from Pirates of the Caribbean’s Quest for the Fountain of Youth. Interestingly, this sea chart does not have fixed coordinates but instead depicts geography alongside chance, fate, the supernatural, and phases of the moon.

This is one of the most epic and visually brilliant maps I have seen. It’s a beautiful weave of artistry, folklore, and map design. Take a look at the full map below.

This map is purported to be made in Asia some time after 1523 and thus has a principally 16th-century cartographic style with Chinese influenced aesthetics. For example, the map features Chinese symbols and characters as well as drawings of dragons which are harbingers of good fortune in war and tigers which are the devourers of evil spirits.

Painted on handmade Japanese rice paper, these navigational charts could be used by rotating the layered rings. Lining one up with another, the reader may use the chart to find a number of mystical destinations.

I pointed out this map style because I believe it’s beautiful and leaves generous room for art and creativity. Now, let’s look at the traditional world map design.

Background on Map Projections

The way the world is depicted on a map (flat surface) is called a map projection. Projections can be practical such as for navigation and visualisation but also artistic or political. The one we are most familiar with and the standard is called the Mercator projection. This rectangular projection was created by the Flemish cartographer Gerardus Mercator in 1569 and is widely adopted because of its ability to represent lines of constant course or rhumb lines which is highly useful for nautical purposes.

Mercator World Map 1569

The other common depictions are the oval-shaped one, called Mollewide projection and orange-peel one, called Goode homolosine. See a list of map projections here.

The Center for Spatially Integrated Social Science (CSISS) has a fantastic, comprehensive list of map projections and PDF map downloads which we reference and use.

The Butterfly Map is also a truly fascinating map projection created by Bernard J. S. Cahill, a cartographer and architect, in 1909. The famous Waterman Butterfly Map was based on this design. It’s simply stunning.

It’s also flexible. The world can be maneuvered to fit on the Butterfly map projection to draw importance to the centred area. For example, the map below was used for the Panama-Pacific Universal Exposition in San Francisco. This Butterfly Map was discerningly centred on North America, specifically San Francisco to give importance while other continents are extended to the sides.

Cahill Butterfly Map



If you’re interested in the subject of map projections, this website gives excellent and ample information on the topic as well as good historical context: An introduction to cartography emphasizing map projections: their properties, applications and basic mathematics.

For most people though, this xkcd comic is enough to get familiar with popular map projections. The the idea behind the comic is someone’s “favorite” map projection can divulge their personality. Full explanation here.

I especially love this one:

So what is the best world map projection? That’s debatable. However, this video humorously demonstrates why there are so many map projections and for valid reasons. From the video:

Guy: Would it blow your mind if I told you that Africa in reality is 14 times larger [than Greenland]?

Girl: Yes!

Oh god, it makes us map lovers seem like such nerds. $20 membership for the newsletter. Hilarious! Love it.

Famous World Maps

At Wellingtons Travel, we do comprehensive research on historic maps to ensure authenticity in our work. It’s actually really fascinating. The University of Alabama Historic Maps of the World, the David Rumsey Map Collection, and World Maps Online have been invaluable in our research because of their immense libraries of genuine, well-documented maps. For example, these maps coincided with the Napoleonic Wars (also Duke of Wellington’s time) during 1801-1825. And these are just some really old maps.

Another wonderful source of research and inspiration for us has been Past Present Gallery of World Maps.

The map below is believed to be the work of Maritime Explorer Christopher Columbus, made in the workshop of Bartolomeo and Christopher Columbus in Lisbon circa 1490 two years before he discovered the Americas.

Columbus Map c1490



Interestingly though, it is said Columbus used the Martellus World Map (made by a German cartographer living in Florence c1490) to persuade Ferdinand of Aragon and Isabella of Castile to support his expeditions. This map was used by Columbus to espouse there wasn’t such a great distance between Europe and China by sea. It was the latest and most accurate portrayal of the world at the time, being the first to record the point of the Cape of Good Hope in South Africa.

Martellus World Map c 1490

The Cape of Good Hope discovery by Portuguese navigator Bartolomeu Dias in 1488 was historically significant because it proved that there wasn’t a land link to Asia in the south, meaning Europe could reach the treasures of the East Indies by sea.

Another famous world map is the Waldseemüller World Map, published in 1507. This was the first world map to include Americas and name it so.

Waldseemüller World Map 1507



The wall map consists of twelve sections printed from woodcuts and uses a modified Ptolemaic map projection with curved meridians to depict the whole surface of the Earth.

Commission by the Duke of Lorraine thirteen years after Christopher Columbus first landed in the “new world”, this map took two years to produce by German cartographers Martin Waldseemüller and Matthias Ringmann and a group of scholars at a monastery in Saint-Die in France.



The result was stunningly accurate and surprisingly modern. In an interview with Reuters John Hebert, Chief of the Geography and Map Division at the Library of Congress, describes:

“The actual shape of South America is correct,” said Hebert. “The width of South America at certain key points is correct within 70 miles of accuracy.”



“Given what Europeans are believed to have known about the world at the time, it should not have been possible for the mapmakers to produce it,” he said.



The map gives a reasonably correct depiction of the west coast of South America. But according to history, Vasco Nunez de Balboa did not reach the Pacific by land until 1513, and Ferdinand Magellan did not round the southern tip of the continent until 1520.



“So this is a rather compelling map to say, ‘How did they come to that conclusion,’” Hebert said.



The mapmakers say they based it on the 1,300-year-old works of the Egyptian geographer Ptolemy as well as letters Florentine navigator Amerigo Vespucci wrote describing his voyages to the new world. But Hebert said there must have been something more.

It is thought most mapmakers at the time still erroneously believed that the lands discovered by Christopher Columbus and Vespucci were part of the Indies of Asia. In fact, Columbus doggedly clung to this belief in crossing the Atlantic Ocean that he had reached the vicinity of China until his death.

Five centuries ago Waldseemüller and Ringmann printed 1,000 copies of a giant world map to broadcast their new theory; now only one copy of the map survives. This map is recognised as one of the most important geographical documents of all time - being the first to depict the New World surrounded by water; first to portray the existence of the Pacific Ocean in between the newly discovered territory and Asia (the first record of Europeans to set eyes on this ocean was six years later 1513 by Spanish explorer Vasco Núñez de Balboa); first to portray the world’s continents and oceans roughly as we know them today; and finally, the first to name the land America.

Calling it America’s birth certificate, the Library of Congress bought the map for the $10 million dollars in 2003.

National Geographic World Maps

One of the most respected and prolific map pedlars in the world is the National Geographic Society which has modified its world maps and map projections over the years. In 1922, it adopted the Van der Grinten projection that depicts the globe in a circle rather than a rectangle or an ellipse. In 1988, the Van der Grinten projection was supplanted by the Robinson projection, which was then superseded in 1995 by the Winkel Tripel projection on its signature world maps. Winkel Tripel is considered to be one of the most accurate representations of the round globe on a flat surface.

The Winkel Tripel projection is currently used on their best selling world map (pictured above).

Online Maps

Many popular online map services like Google Maps and OpenStreetMap use a variation of the Mercator projection for map tiles.

On a side note, I was explaining to someone I made maps a few days ago when she asked, “Hasn’t most of the world been discovered by now?” This was too good of a setup to pass up on. I can’t believe I didn’t get this question before. I replied “Oh sure, Magellan did a pretty good job… but there’s still a lot of water and land out there that we don’t really know about.”

I hope she got the sarcasm.

Final Note

If you’re still with us, you must really love maps, design, and travel. This is a plug for my company’s upcoming project. If you haven’t heard, we’re working on a World Map at Wellingtons Travel and if you want to be notified when you can buy it or get involved before it’s released via Kickstarter, sign up for this blog or the company newsletter (only a few emails a year).

Taige Zhang

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