History of Geography

1. History of Geography Unit One

2. 4 Traditions of Geography Developed by William Pattison • Earth Science Tradition – physical geography, Earth’s features • Locational Tradition – making maps • Cultural Environment Tradition – describing people and how they live • Area-Analysis Tradition

3. Why did people study geography? • Evolved over the last 5,000 years of human civilization • Practical reasons: trade routes to distant and dangerous lands • Phoenicians – sea faring culture, colonized the Mediterranean, travelled into the Atlantic • Modern alphabet comes from Phoenicians

5. Greek geographers • Eratosthenes (Ἐρατοσθένης) 276BC-195BC • Chief librarian at Alexandria, Egypt • Accurately calculated the circumference of the Earth, invented the term “geography” • Ptolemy (Πτολεμαῖος) AD90-168 • Guide to Geography • Used a global grid system similar to latitude and longitude

7. Eratosthenes Map of the World

8. Ptolemy’s Map of the World

9. Age of Exploration • Little advance in geography was made until 1400 - (European Dark Ages AD 500 – 1000) • Explorations by Chinese, Muslims and Europeans expanded human knowledge of the world

10. Zheng He • Chinese explorer/trader in early 1400s • Indian Ocean, east coast of Africa

11. China’s 1418 World Map?

12. European Explorers • Bartholomeu Dias – Tip of Africa, entered Indian Ocean • Da Gama – sailed all the way to India, opened trade routes for Portugal

13. Christopher Columbus – discovered the Caribbean while trying to get to India

14. Magellan – first voyage to circumnavigate the Earth

15. 1507 Map of the World

16. 16th Century Map of Americas

17. Is geography still important? • The whole world has been mapped and discovered • Google Earth • Geography now focuses on the five themes – discovering patterns, looking at changes in places and people