The greatest achievement of this age was the triangulation
and topographic mapping of France, directed by the members
of the cosine family. Map making has become concentrated in
large governmental and private offices, producing maps by
the millions, reaching great masses of people.
Traditional methods and manual drawing still also may be
employed. One can not underestimate the value of the
experience of manually plotting as it leads to a much
enhanced ability to use and evaluate properly the many
features found in maps.
9.2. Definition
A map is a simplified selective, symbolized diminished and a
plane representation of a part or the whole of the earth’s
surface on a piece of paper. A map provides a bird’s eye view
of the earth’s surface or a part of it.
The map makers are always selective and should limit the
amount of information to be shown on the map. Otherwise,
the map becomes difficult to read or it would be over crowded
and confusing. This shows that in any map the information is
summarized or simplified by avoiding unnecessary details.
The features of the earth in any map are reduced or
diminished in size because the drawing of maps which is
exactly equal to the area of the place to be mapped is
impossible.