Bøger af Jerry Brotton

Great Maps takes a close look at the history of maps, from ancient maps such as medieval mappae mundi to Google Earth. Why do we put north at the top of maps? Which maps show us the way to Heaven, and which show the "e;land of no sunshine"e; or the land of "e;people with no bowels"e;? In Great Maps, author and historian Jerry Brotton tells the hidden story behind more than 60 of the most significant maps from around the world, picking out key features, stories, and techniques in rich visual detail to reveal the inner meaning buried within the landscape.Maps are not just geographical data: they reflect a particular ideological, historical, or cultural context. Providing a unique insight into how mapmakers have used maps to shape and depict their world view, this beautifully illustrated book traces the development of human development and culture through its maps. From the earliest rock carvings to the latest geospatial technology, from ancient medieval mappae mundi to the first road atlas, Great Maps explores in stunning photographic detail how maps have influenced and reflected our world throughout history.

This book is a treasure-trove of cartographical delights spanning over a thousand years. Each map is accompanied by a narrative revealing the story behind how it came to be made and the significance of what it shows. The chronological arrangement highlights how cartography has evolved over the centuries.

Jerry Brotton is the presenter of the acclaimed BBC4 series 'Maps: Power, Plunder and Possession'. Here he tells the story of our world through maps.Throughout history, maps have been fundamental in shaping our view of the world, and our place in it. But far from being purely scientific objects, world maps are unavoidably ideological and subjective, intimately bound up with the systems of power and authority of particular times and places. Mapmakers do not simply represent the world, they construct it out of the ideas of their age.In this scintillating book, Jerry Brotton examines the significance of 12 maps - from the mystical representations of ancient history to the satellite-derived imagery of today. He vividly recreates the environments and circumstances in which each of the maps was made, showing how each conveys a highly individual view of the world - whether the Jerusalem-centred Christian perspective of the 14th century Hereford Mappa Mundi or the Peters projection of the 1970s which aimed to give due weight to 'the third world'.Although the way we map our surroundings is once more changing dramatically, Brotton argues that maps today are no more definitive or objective than they have ever been - but that they continue to make arguments and propositions about the world, and to recreate, shape and mediate our view of it. Readers of this book will never look at a map in quite the same way again.

From the New York Times bestselling author of A History of the World in Twelve Maps, this is the revelatory history of the four cardinal directions that have oriented and defined our place on the globe for millennia North, south, east, and west: almost all societies use these four cardinal directions to orientate themselves and to understand who they are by projecting where they are. For millennia, these four directions have been foundational to our travel, navigation, and exploration, and are central to the imaginative, moral, and political geography of virtually every culture in the world. Yet they are far more subjective--and sometimes contradictory--than we might realize.Four Points of the Compass takes us on a journey of directional discovery. Societies have understood and defined directions in very different ways based on their locations in time and space. Historian Jerry Brotton reveals why Hebrew culture privileges east; why Renaissance Europeans began drawing north at the top of their maps; why early Islam revered the south; why the Aztecs used five color-coded cardinal directions; and why no societies, primitive or modern, have ever orientated themselves westwards. In doing so, politically-loaded but widely used terms such as the "Middle East," the "Global South." the "West Indies," the "Orient." and even the "western world" take on new meanings. Who decided on these terms and what do they mean for geopolitics? How have directions like "east" and "west" taken on the status of cultural identities--or more accurately stereotypes? Yet today, because of GPS capability, cardinal points are less relevant. Online, we place ourselves at the center of the map as little blue dots moving across geospatial apps; we have become the most important compass point, though in the process we've disconnected ourselves from the natural world. Imagining what future changes technology may impose, Jerry Brotton skillfully reminds us how crucial the four cardinal directions have been to everyone who has ever walked our planet.

The fascinating story of Queen Elizabeth's secret outreach to the Muslim world, which set England on the path to empire, by The New York Times bestselling author of A History of the World in Twelve MapsWe think of England as a great power whose empire once stretched from India to the Americas, but when Elizabeth Tudor was crowned Queen, it was just a tiny and rebellious Protestant island on the fringes of Europe, confronting the combined power of the papacy and of Catholic Spain. Broke and under siege, the young queen sought to build new alliances with the great powers of the Muslim world. She sent an emissary to the Shah of Iran, wooed the king of Morocco, and entered into an unprecedented alliance with the Ottoman Sultan Murad III, with whom she shared a lively correspondence. The Sultan and the Queen tells the riveting and largely unknown story of the traders and adventurers who first went East to seek their fortunes-and reveals how Elizabeth's fruitful alignment with the Islamic world, financed by England's first joint stock companies, paved the way for its transformation into a global commercial empire.

A superbly illustrated guide to 64 maps from all around the world! From examples of medieval Mappa Mundi and the first atlas to Google Earth and maps of the moon, this captivating maps book is a must-have for all history and geography enthusiasts and explorers! Embark on a visual tour of the world's finest maps! This fascinating world atlas book:    ¿ Analyses each map visually, with the help of pull-outs and graphic close-up details    ¿ Traces the history of maps chronologically, providing a fascinating overview of cartography through the ages    ¿ Tells the story behind each map - why it was created, who it was for, and how it was achieved    ¿ Profiles key cartographers, explorers and artists    ¿ Draws together navigation, propaganda, power, art and politics through the world's greatest maps Maps are much more than just geographical data. They are an accurate reflection of the culture and context of different time frames in history. This remarkable geography book puts cartography on the map! It tells the stories behind great maps through stunning pull-out details and reveals how they have helped people make sense of the world. Embark on a global adventure of a lifetime with this world map book and see our planet like never before! On this mind-blowing journey, you'll encounter maps that show the way to heaven, depict lands with no sunshine, and even the world ocean floor.  With incredible secret stories from British historian Jerry Brotton and insight into how mapmakers have expressed their world views, Great Maps is a welcome addition to any armchair cartographer's bookshelf.

North, south, east and west: almost all societies use the four cardinal directions to orientate themselves, to understand who they are by projecting where they are. For millennia, these four directions have been foundational to our travel, navigation and exploration and are central to the imaginative, moral and political geography of virtually every culture in the world. Yet they are far more subjective and various - sometimes contradictory - than we might realise.The Four Points of the Compass takes the reader on a journey of directional discovery. Jerry Brotton reveals why Hebrew culture privileges east; why Renaissance Europeans began drawing north at the top of their maps; why the imperial Chinese revered the south; why the Aztecs used five colour-coded cardinal directions; and why no societies, primitive or modern, have ever orientated themselves westwards. He ends by reflecting on our digital age in which we, the little blue dot on the screen, have become the most important compass point. Throughout, Brotton shows that the directions reflect a human desire to create order and that they only have meaning, literally and metaphorically, depending on where you stand.

Drawing on the Bodleian Library's outstanding map collection and covering almost a thousand years, 'Talking Maps' takes a new approach to map-making by showing how maps and stories have always been intimately entwined.

Offering an account of the status of maps and geographical knowledge in the Early Modern world, this work focuses on how early European geographers mapped the territories of the Old World (Africa and South-East Asia).

In this generously illustrated book, Jerry Brotton documents the dramatic changes in the nature of geographical representation which took place during the sixteenth century, explaining how much they convey about the transformation of European culture...

In 1570, when it became clear she would never be gathered into the Catholic fold, Elizabeth I was excommunicated by the Pope. On the principle that 'my enemy's enemy is my friend', this marked the beginning of an extraordinary English alignment with the Muslim powers who were fighting Catholic Spain in the Mediterranean, and of cultural, economic and political exchanges with the Islamic world of a depth not experienced again until the modern age. England signed treaties with the Ottoman Porte, received ambassadors from the kings of Morocco and shipped munitions to Marrakesh. By the late 1580s hundreds, perhaps thousands, of Elizabethan merchants, diplomats, sailors, artisans and privateers were plying their trade from Morocco to Persia.They included the resourceful mercer Anthony Jenkinson who met both S leyman the Magnificent and the Persian Shah Tahmasp in the 1560s, William Harborne, the Norfolk merchant who became the first English ambassador to the Ottoman court in 1582 and the adventurer Sir Anthony Sherley, who spent much of 1600 at the court of Shah Abbas the Great. The previous year, remarkably, Elizabeth sent the Lancastrian blacksmith Thomas Dallam to the Ottoman capital to play his clockwork organ in front of Sultan Mehmed. The awareness of Islam which these Englishmen brought home found its way into many of the great cultural productions of the day, including most famously Marlowe's Tamburlaine, and Shakespeare's Titus Andronicus and The Merchant of Venice. The year after Dallam's expedition the Moroccan ambassador, Abd al-Wahid bin Mohammed al-Annuri, spent six months in London with his entourage. Shakespeare probably began to write Othello six months later.This Orient Isle shows that England's relations with the Muslim world were far more extensive, and often more amicable, than we have appreciated, and that their influence was felt across the political, commercial and domestic landscape of Elizabethan England. It is a startlingly unfamiliar picture of part of our national and international history.

In this groundbreaking, highly provocative examination of the Renaissance, Jerry Brotton and Lisa Jardine raise questions about the formation of cultural identity in Western Europe. Through an analysis of the circulation of art and luxury objects, the...