Foundations of modern cartography now visible online and in detail on the Harry Ransom Center’s website

Joan Blaeu’s world map “Nova Totius Terrarum Orbis Tabula,” 1648. The Ransom Center’s copy, one of only two known to exist and the only colored copy, survives complete with an accompanying text. Photo by Pete Smith.

A manuscript map of Virginia that was produced in the earliest period of English settlement in America (ca. 1610). The map’s written legends provide evidence of the attempts of the Virginia Company and the settlers to deal with the Native American tribes. The map is among the earliest of Virginia that survive; only three others from the period of the settlement are known.

Coronelli celestial globe, ca. 1688. Photo by Pete Smith.