ABSTRACT
One reason for the apparent paucity of medieval maps is that the images in the literary or historical sources are not always recognized as maps or thought worth reporting. This chapter considers selected aspects of maps in the medieval period in Europe. Mappaemundi are perhaps the best-known European medieval maps. The most important geographical and urban features of the world indicated on the mappaemundi come from information found in the texts of the most influential writers and encyclopaedists of Late Antiquity, notably Orosius and Isidore of Seville. This geographical information, however, was selected and arranged on the maps according to its chronological, historical, biblical and cultural importance in relation to the unfolding of the human history that started with Adam and Eve in the terrestrial paradise in the east. Some kinds of graphic guidelines may have been involved in the building of cathedrals, improvement of watercourses and laying out of hunting routes, for example, but formal maps were rarely produced.
