Inuit Cartography

7/19/2011

As a cartographer looking for work in Nuuk, I've become pretty interested in what sort of historical mapping and base data (potentially useful to yours truly) are available for Greenland. In my research I've learned about some interesting cartographic specimens that use wood as their medium. Unfortunately these won't be too immediately useful to me as they're not exactly geodatabase-ready... but interesting subject matter nonetheless.

Excerpt from the September 1933 issue of "Popular Science".

I pulled the article clip at left from the blog Modern Mechanix, which reprints items from old Popular Science magazines. Pretty cool, if a bit lacking in political correctness.

I wonder about the claim that the "eskimo" had "never before seen a map." Perhaps not a paper map-- but as you'll see below, there are other options.

In English, the caption reads: "Kuniit's three wooden (tree) maps show the journey from Sermiligaaq to Kangertittivatsiaq. Map to the right shows the islands along the coast, while the map in the middle shows the mainland and is read from one side of the block around to the other. Map to the left shows the peninsula between the fjords Sermiligaaq and Kangertivartikajik." From "Topografisk Atlas Grønland", published by Det Kongeglige Danske Geografiske Selskab, 2000 (pg 171).

At left, a closer look at the maps. Apparently they were "discovered" in 1880 by a Danish explorer named Gustav Holm, who was leading an expedition to the Ammassalik coast of eastern Greenland. I'm not sure if similar maps exist for the west coast (although the carved map featured in the Popular Science article above is from the west coast.)

I'm especially enamored with the fact that the maps are meant to be read up one side and down the other. Who needs a north arrow?? Not these guys. Very efficient use of space that I may employ in the near future.

From some accounts I've read (source: general googling), it also seems these maps were carved more to be felt than actually read-- which does seem quite practical for kayak or boat travel in potential darkness.

If you'd like to find out more, I believe all of this is properly and academically chronicled in The History of Cartography, Volume 2, Book 3: Cartography in the Traditional African, American, Arctic, Australian, and Pacific Societies. A nice beach read for a lazy summer afternoon.

7 Comments

Ryan O'Donnell link

7/20/2011 03:08:43 am

Cool! The island map seems like a bit of a stretch - the relative sizes of islands don't seem to match up very well, and several of the larger islands are completely missing. I wonder if the scientists misinterpreted its location and/or scale? The central, wrap-around map seems right on and is very convincing. I also wonder if the wrap-around point on the central map might indicate home for the carver?

Yugan link

9/4/2016 06:16:13 am

Maybe the maps are scaled to a man rowing a kayak. A stretch across the ocean may not be far in a straight line, but there may be currents that make it "further away" than another place.

jerry

7/25/2011 03:19:44 am

I like this kind of stuff. Seems many primitives had such method of getting around. I think, though, that I would rather be kayaking/canoeing around in the south pacific rather than the far north. http://thenonist.com/index.php/thenonist/permalink/stick_charts/

Barbara Liles

10/13/2011 07:52:26 am

Anna, I am thrilled to see the wooden maps and to find your blog. I am a writer/ex-teacher/children's librarian and am writing a historical fiction about the demise of the Norse settlements in Greenland. I found the maps in my research and they are worked into my story. I'm realizing that I may need to actually go to Greenland, but until then I'm trying to find English speaking folks in the area who might be willing to answer questions for me. Please let me know if you are interested!
Thanks, Barbara
www.quirkytales-oldandnew.blogspot.com/
http://bel-biblio.blogspot.com/

Justin Kolbek

9/13/2016 02:22:59 pm

This article is very interesting. What interests me a lot is how the people who found these maps determined that they were maps and not just simply objects. It was a great idea to intend for the maps to be felt, as well as observed. To me, looking at the map would give a good picture of what the area looked like, whereas feeling it could give a different picture of the type of terrain, altitude, and so forth.

Carol Chacon

9/14/2016 08:39:00 am

What I find interesting about this article is the idea of the many different types of maps that exist in the world. Today, we are used to the traditional map but little did I know that there were other forms of mapping a long time ago. The map used by an eskimo was a carving of a route and read from up to down on one side and down-up on the other. This proves that there is no exact way to really create a map, as long as it gets you from point a to b.

Mabande

7/1/2017 09:04:37 am

These are really interesting!

A thought struck me when shown the facsimilie from Topologisk Atlas on Twitter today (six years after your post): I think the authors positioned the peninsula carving in the opposite North/South direction, cause if you follow the coast line on the tactile map it makes more sense to flip it due to the recession on the lower left side of it matches the large bay on the northeast side of the peninsula in the paper map (and following the topology of the wooden map it's pretty much a replica of the peninsula) :)

Inuit Cartography

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