Piri Reis and The Map Makers and Dava Sobel

@brittarnhild

Maps, atlases, globes.
Even only writing the words gives me goosebumps.

All the world is hidden inside a globe.

A map is one of the first things I buy when I start to plan for a travel.
Today I have been over to amazon to buy an Ethiopia map.....

Have you ever considered the history of maps?
It is easy today with planes and photograpies from the air. But what about hundreds of years ago. Thousands of years ago.

I am reading The Map Makers by John Noble Wilford. I am not reading fast, only a few pages a day. There is so much to digest, so much information to swallow, so many ahs and ohs to think of.

Before going to Istabul two weeks ago, I had read about Piri Reis, and was looking forward to see the map at Topkapi Palace. The guide didn´t mention it, but when we got an hour to explore the palace by ourselves, I went on a map hunt. What a disappointment when I learned that the place where the map was displayed was under renovation. 

I did manage to buy a book though,
Before and After Piri Reis, Maps at Topkapi Palace.

Dava Sobel, a favorite author of mine (one of MANY), is a sience writer, sharing so much of her knowledge though her books (and while working on this post I found her blog, which is now added to my blog roll over at BrittArnhild´s House in the Woods). Her first book, Longitude, I discovered many years ago. I have been searching high and low for this book the past few days, and it has delayed the post, but I am unable to find it. Either it is playing hide and seek with me, I have lent it to someone and never got it back, or I have given it away.

I do have two other of Dava Sobel´s books though;
Galileo´s Daughter, which I also read many years ago and have on my TBRR-list (to be reread),
and A More Perfect Heaven, which has been stanfing unread in my shelves for some time now. But will be read......ASAP.

There must be enough books in my collection for several hundred years of reading.
I try not to think of it :-)

 

    

        

 

Happy reading.

 

By the way, here is a link to Dava Sobel´s page,
which will give you hours of interesting reading.