In olden days when there were no satellites, how were the maps of different countries drawn?

Answer 1

Maps have been a large part of the human story for a long time (maybe 8,000 years - nobody knows exactly, but longer than written words). They were known to have existed in societies of Europe, the Middle East, China, India, and others.

The earliest known map to date is a wall painting of the ancient Turkish city of Çatal Hüyük which has been dated to the late 7th millennium BCE. Other known maps of the ancient world include the Minoan “House of the Admiral” wall painting from c. 1600 BCE showing a seaside community in an oblique perspective, and an engraved map of the holy Babylonian city of Nippur, from the Kassite period (14th – 12th centuries BCE).[3] The ancient Greeks and Romans created maps beginning with Anaximander in the 6th century BC. In ancient China, although geographical literature spans back to the 5th century BC, the drawing of true geographical maps were not begun in earnest until the first half of the Han Dynasty (202 BC-202 AD), largely with the works of Prince Liu An (179 BC-122 BC).

Mappa mundi is the general term used to describe Medieval European maps of the world. Approximately 1,100 mappae mundi are known to have survived from the Middle Ages. Of these, some 900 are found illustrating manuscripts and the remainder exist as stand-alone documents (Woodward, p. 286).

In the Age of Exploration from the 15th century to the 17th century, cartographers both copied earlier maps (some of which had been passed down for centuries) and drew their own based on explorers' observations and new surveying techniques. The invention of the magnetic compass, telescope and sextant enabled increasing accuracy.

Due to the sheer physical difficulties inherent in cartography, map-makers frequently lifted material from earlier works without giving credit to the original cartographer. For example, one of the most famous early maps of North America is unofficially known as the Beaver Map, published in 1715 by Herman Moll. This map is an exact reproduction of a 1698 work by Nicolas de Fer. De Fer in turn had copied images that were first printed in books by Louis Hennepin, published in 1697, and François Du Creux, in 1664. By the 1700s, map-makers started to give credit to the original engraver by printing the phrase "After [the original cartographer]" on the work.[4]


Technological changes
In cartography, technology has continually changed in order to meet the demands of new generations of mapmakers and map users. The first maps were manually constructed with brushes and parchment and therefore varied in quality and were limited in distribution. The advent of magnetic devices, such as the compass and much later magnetic storage devices, allowed for the creation of far more accurate maps and the ability to store and manipulate them digitally.

Advances in mechanical devices such as the printing press, quadrant and vernier allowed for the mass production of maps and the ability to make accurate reproductions from more accurate data. Optical technology, such as the telescope, sextant and other devices that use telescopes, allowed for accurate surveying of land and the ability of mapmakers and navigators to find their latitude by measuring angles to the North Star at night or the sun at noon.

Advances in photochemical technology, such as the lithographic and photochemical processes, have allowed for the creation of maps that have fine details, do not distort in shape and resist moisture and wear. This also eliminated the need for engraving which further shortened the time it takes to make and reproduce maps.

In the late 20th century and early 21st century advances in electronic technology led to a new revolution in cartography. Specifically, computer hardware devices such as computer screens, plotters, printers, scanners (remote and document) and analytic stereo plotters along with visualization, image processing, spatial analysis and database software, have democratized and greatly expanded the making of maps. The ability to superimpose spatially located variables onto existing maps created new uses for maps and new industries to explore and exploit these potentials. See also digital raster graphic.


Map types
In understanding basic maps, the field of cartography can be divided into two general categories: general cartography and thematic cartography. General cartography involves those maps that are constructed for a general audience and thus contain a variety of features. General maps exhibit many reference and location systems and often are produced in a series. For example the 1:24,000 scale topographic maps of the United States Geological Survey (USGS) are a standard as compared to the 1:50,000 scale Canadian maps. The government of the UK produces the classic 1:63,360 (1 inch to 1 mile) "Ordnance Survey" maps of the entire UK and with a range of correlated larger- and smaller-scale maps of great detail.

A topographic map is primarily concerned with the topographic description of a place, including (especially in the 20th century) the use of contour lines showing elevation. Terrain or relief can be shown in a variety of ways (see Cartographic relief depiction).

A topological map is a very general type of map, the kind you might sketch on a napkin. It often disregards scale in the interest of clarity of communicating specific route or relational information.

Thematic cartography involves maps of specific geographic themes oriented toward specific audiences. A couple of examples might be a dot map showing corn production in Indiana or a shaded area map of Ohio counties divided into numerical choropleth classes. As the volume of geographic data has exploded over the last century, thematic cartography has become increasingly useful and necessary to interpret spatial cultural and social data.

Answer 2

in olden days on the maps most of the world was shown as ocean.this was because nobody had gone to places so nobody knew that a certain place existed.
then as people started travelling they found out new places and these places started adding up on the map.
the outlines of the countries were very crude and generally drawn with the help of the description and measurements given by the travellers and discoverers.
for example the shape of australia in older maps was not exactly like the shape of australia what we now know.

Answer 3

you would start at a known point.

you would stretch a surveyors measuring chain of 66 feet in a known direction.

Repeat.

The Mason Dixon Line in America was measured exactly that way....240 miles through forests measured 66 feet at a time.

In 2003 it was checked by GPS systems. It was 45 foot out over 240 miles.

Answer 4

The following should provide you enough information to explore further, if you want:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_cartography

Answer 5

By exploration

Answer 6

Quill pens and guestimates.

Answer 7

imagination