Monthly Archives: November 2006

Maps on old postcards look really cool, I think (see previous post). So I looked for another one, and found this postcard, dating from 1929. Coincidentally, it illustrates another area peripheral to Germany: the Free City of Danzig.

The story of Amikejo is a fantastic piece of obscure cartographic and cultural history: Amikejo was the world’s first and only state based on the ideals of the Esperantist movement. It was founded in a tiny (3,5 km²), wedge-shaped area … Continue reading →

This map illustrates the ‘Totem Foods’ of North America, celebrating ”the many distinctive regional food traditions on the North American continent by featuring a totem food key to the identity of each region. These totem foods are more than just important … Continue reading →

A variation on post #10 in this blog, done by Alexander Cheek and to be found on this page of his website. The differences between these two maps indicate that neighbourhoods in Manhattan are ‘fluid’, and constantly evolving.

The application of the suffix -stan (Persian for ‘home’) generally refers to countries in central Asia – in fact, the formerly Soviet states that occupy Central Asia are sometimes referred to collectively as ‘The Stans’. When used in other contexts, … Continue reading →

Russell Richards is an artist who (as far as I can tell) lives and works in Charlottesville, Virginia. I like his work, very funny and direct. In my mind, it combines interesting aspects of comic strip art with Picasso’s semi-abstract … Continue reading →

Africa remains the least developed continent, and the most plagued by disease, poverty and malnutrition. The ‘dark continent’ also largely remains off the news radar in the developed world, although it’s not clear to me whether that is a consequence … Continue reading →

This isn’t a political, but a commercial world map: it specifies the six distinct global ‘DVD regions’ of the world. DVD is short for ‘digital video disc’, the successor to the analog VHS system. Contrary to VHS tapes, which were … Continue reading →

Since the Turkish invasion of 1974, the island of Cyprus is divided into two main entities: an internationally recognised Greek republic in the south, and a Turkish republic of northern Cyprus, only recognised by Turkey. The situation on the ground … Continue reading →

The The once sang about Great Britain being the ’51st State of the USA’ – a comment on the culture and foreign policy of the United Kingdom, which were then as now dominated by those of the United States. This … Continue reading →

Not so much strange as just darn purty, this map of Newfoundland on a postage stamp, probably dating from before 1949, when it became a province of Canada (this happened after a referendum in which the other option was independence, … Continue reading →

‘Volkstaat’ is Afrikaans for People’s state – the people in this case being the white South Africans who identify themselves as ‘Afrikaners’ (mainly descendents of Dutch settlers, speaking a language derived from Dutch and considering themselves an indigenous nation in … Continue reading →

I don’t remember where I got this map from, but the context seems quite straightforward. The two figures in the foreground are saying “ein Geschwür!” (literally: “an ulcer”) and “Da sei Gott vor!” (“may God prevent this”). It must be … Continue reading →

All results of a nationwide election in the US can usually be translated into a ‘binary’ map, divided into red states (Republican, mainly in the middle) and blue states (Democratic, mostly on the coasts). In January of 2004, the Boston … Continue reading →