British Town Maps

Overview

Towns are complex and sophisticated creations. Mapping towns stretched cartographers' ingenuity to new heights of both artistic beauty and scientific exactitude as they strove to represent and communicate the physical patterns of streets, buildings, and spaces; the "above ground" and the "below ground;" the built structures and the economy; the lives of those who live or work there; and the unseen realities of land ownership, administration, religion, and politics.These maps served a variety of purposes, from guiding travelers, assisting with administration and government, raising taxes, planning the built environment, organizing its defense—and much, much more. Some of the maps in this book are well known, others have languished in obscurity, deep in archives, until revealed by the 10 years' work of a British Academy research project on which this book is founded. Lavishly illustrated in color, it tells the story of the mapping of urban Britain from the late middle ages until modern times. The text is accompanied by a comprehensive index of town maps which have been cataloged on an open-access electronic resource.

Author Biography

Roger J.P. Kain is Dean and Chief Executive of the School of Advanced Study, University of London and a Vice-President of the British Academy. He is a leading cartographic historian and author of 12 other books on British maps, three of them co-authored with Dr. Richard Oliver. His previous British Library publication is English Maps: A History. Richard Oliver is Honorary Research Fellow at the University of Exeter and is author of seven books on Ordnance Survey history.