ABSTRACT
Scientific Geography as we know it today is the product of the nineteenth century, or more precisely of the hundred and fifty years beginning about 1750. It was during that period that the great formulators (Kant, Humboldt, Ritter, Peschel, Ratzel) defined the scope and content of the subject and elaborated the method of collecting, organizing, and presenting its material. But the science is very much older; its roots extend far back into antiquity. The earliest records of man’s interest in the nature of the physical world around him contain observations and speculations of geographical type. No science can claim a longer genealogy than geography.
