Cartography of Palestine


The cartography of the region of Palestine, also known as cartography of the Holy Land and cartography of the Land of Israel, is the creation, editing, processing and printing of maps of the region of Palestine from ancient times until the rise of modern surveying techniques. For several centuries during the Middle Ages it was the most prominent subject in all of cartography, and it has been described as an "obsessive subject of map art".
The history of the mapping of Palestine is dominated by two cartographic traditions: the biblical school and the classical school. The earliest surviving maps of the biblical tradition derive from the attempts of the early Church Fathers to identify and illustrate the primary locations mentioned in the Bible, and to provide maps for Christian pilgrimage. The earliest surviving maps of the classical tradition derive from the scientific and historical works of the Greco-Roman world. Many Graeco-Roman geographers described the Palestine region in their writings; however, there are no surviving pre-modern originals or copies of these maps – illustrations today of maps according to geographers such as Hecataeus, Herodotus or Eratosthenes are modern reconstructions. The earliest surviving classical maps of the region are Byzantine versions of Ptolemy's 4th Asia map. Cartographic history of Palestine thus begins with Ptolemy, whose work was based on that of the local geographer Marinus of Tyre; the European rediscovery of Ptolemy's works in the 1400s ended the domination of the biblical tradition.
The first lists of maps of the region were made in the late 19th century, by Titus Tobler in his 1867 Geographical Bibliography of Palestine and subsequently by Reinhold Röhricht in his 1890 Geographical Library of Palestine. In a series of articles in the Journal of the German Association for the Study of Palestine between 1891 and 1895, Röhricht presented the first detailed analysis of maps of the region in the middle- and the late Middle Ages. They were followed in 1939-40 by :de:Hans Fischer |Hans Fischer's History of the Cartography of Palestine. The article lists maps that progressed the cartography of region before the rise of modern surveying techniques, showing how mapmaking and surveying improved and helped outsiders to better understand the geography of the area. Imaginary maps and copies of existing maps are excluded.

Notable maps of Palestine

Early maps (2nd–10th centuries)

Crusader maps (12th–14th centuries)

DateTitleCartographerCommentsRegion name givenImage
1154Tabula RogerianaThe Tabula Rogeriana was created in 1154AD; copy from 1533.The middle of the right hand page label translit=Filasṭīn
1100sAshburnham Libri mapunknownEurope’s oldest surviving sheet map after the ninth-century Plan of Saint Gall.no regional name shown
1100sTournai mapunknown12th century copy of a map of Asia may which accompanied a manuscript of De situ et nominibus locorum Hebraeorum, a 4th-5th century work of Jerome.no regional name shown
1250Oxford Outremer mapCreated in c.1250, thought to be by Matthew ParisThe Kishon River has the following text along it: lit=This river, which is small, divides Syria from Palestine, that is, the Holy Land, which is to the south, and Palestine, which is to the North.
1300Earliest Burchard mapBurchard of Mount SionConsidered to be the oldest known Burchard map.no regional name shown
1300sLater Burchard mapBurchard of Mount SionA later map attributed to Burchard.no regional name shown
1321Sanudo-Vesconte mapDescribed by Adolf Erik Nordenskiöld as "the first non-Ptolemaic map of a definite country". Published in Liber Secretorum Fidelium Crucis, a work intended to rekindle the spirit of the crusades. Considered the "first 'modern map' of Palestine" and "served as the basis for most maps of 'Modern Palestine'" throughout the following centuries.Terra Sancta

Notable 15th–18th century maps

Notable 19th century maps

Modern cartography