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France Travel Maps
Summer is just around the corner. For sure many people would spend their
summer vacation visiting places and having an adventure. Traveling is a lot of
fun especially if you are going to a new and exciting place. Nothing can beat
the exciting feeling of seeing new things and meeting new people.
But just before you step off your front lawn make sure that you double check
all your luggages and make sure to carry a map with you especially if you are
going to a new place. Maps will help you go around the place easily. But did you
know that early maps were considered religious icons? Yes, early world maps were
created for religious purposes. And since they represented the worship of God
most maps during the early years were not a useful tool for travel. However, as
the world modernizes so are the uses of maps. Today, modern maps show the world
in ways that allowed a reader to leave home and return.
Admit it, you have drawn and thrown dozens of maps away in your life - the
sketch your friend drew in a table napkin to help you find the frat party; the
map you used when you travel to Indonesia or the atlas that you have used in
history class in high school. All these helped you find a location or make a
spatial sense of the world.
Many museums today have collections of old and new maps. They see to it that
they preserve the maps as they are an important part of a place's history. Map
experts spend their lives learning about maps. The knowledge that they get are
based on hundreds of hours spent on carefully examining maps. This is why even a
simple damage to a map that might not even be noticed by a regular reader can
prove important to an expert.
But map printing is not as easy as you think. The location of buildings,
houses, landmarks and the like should be exact and clear. Even the color of the
map should be appropriate. Woodcut, engraving and lithography are the different
techniques used in producing maps. Woodcut is a relief printing process. It is
the oldest printing technique known. Early on this technique was used for
printing designs on playing cards and religious prints. Engraving, on the other
hand, is the oldest intaglio technique. This has been done to decorate metals
for ages. And lithography uses the repelling properties of grease and water to
print from polished slabs of very fine textured limestone.
So the next time you use or come across a map do not just look at it and
throw it away after use. Remember without it you would have never found the frat
party or have reached the beautiful island in France and you would have
never found your way home.
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