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Mapping the Ancient World: Egypt, Gaul and Byzantium

Greece and Rome dominate our picture of antiquity, but the ancient world was far wider — and early mapmakers charted all of it. From the Nile to the forests of Gaul and the long afterlife of Rome in the East, here is the ancient world as the old cartographers drew it.

The whole known world

The broadest view is d'Anville's map of the Ancient World (1794), which renders the orbis terrarum known to the Greeks and Romans — from Hispania to India, centred on the Mediterranean.

Gaul and Egypt

To the north-west lay the Celtic world of Ancient Gaul (Dufour, 1860), the land of Caesar's campaigns. To the south-east, Covens & Mortier's Arabia and Egypt (1730) charts the Nile, the Red Sea and the deserts of the ancient Near East.

The long afterlife of Rome

Rome did not end in the West. Merian's view of Constantinople (1638) shows the imperial city on the Bosphorus, while Spruner's historical maps of Byzantine Greece and Asia Minor trace the medieval Eastern Empire that carried antiquity into the Middle Ages.

Explore the collection

Every map is restored from a public-domain original as a museum-quality giclée print, framed and delivered. Browse the Ancient World collection →