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Talks and Poster Presentations (with Proceedings-Entry):

M. Lechthaler, A. Millonig:
"Gerhard Mercator- ingenious Cartographer, how accurate is his map of the world from 1569?";
Talk: 24th International Cartographic Conference, Santiago, Chile; 2009-11-15 - 2009-11-21; in: "The World's Geo-Spatial Solution, Conference Proceedings", (2009), ISBN: 978-1-907075-02-5; Paper ID 7_11, 11 pages.



English abstract:
Abstract
Long before people were able to write, maps have been used to visualise reality or fantasy. Their content influenced the way people realized the world. From studying maps conclusions can be drawn how visualized regions are experienced, imagined, or meant to be perceived.
The article will deal with the brief and concise history and development of the world image in the maps from the Old Ages to Gerhard Mercator (1512 - 1594). Mercator was a teacher of the humankind and one of the greatest cartographers who revolutionised cartography. Astounding is the accuracy of the coastline in his Map of the World (1569), which will be presented as well as the reasons why the line-deformation, in comparison to the today´s line-construction of continents in the maps (the same projection and scale), was generate.

Keywords:
History of Cartography, World image in teh maps from Old Ages to Mercator, World Map 1569,

Created from the Publication Database of the Vienna University of Technology.