Vol. II. No. 4.
THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE.
PUBLISHED BY THE
NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC SOCIETY,
WASHINGTON, D. C.
Price, 50 Cents.
CONTENTS.
Korea and the Koreans: Ensign J. B. Bernadou, U. S. N.
(Illustrated with three maps.)
The Ordnance Survey of Great Britain--its history and object: Josiah
Pierce, Jr.
Geographic Nomenclature: Herbert G. Ogden, Gustave Herrle, Marcus
Baker and A. H. Thompson
APPENDIX: Rules for the Orthography of Geographic Names: Contributed
by G. Herrle.
British System
French System
German System
Alphabets: Russian-English
English-Russian
Published, AUGUST, 1890.
PRESS OF TUTTLE, MOREHOUSE & TAYLOR, NEW HAVEN, CONN.
THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE.
Vol. II. 1890. No. 4.
KOREA AND THE KOREANS.
BY J. B. BERNADOU.
(Abstract of lecture, with the addition of some new material.)
The Koreans are to be noted among nations for the possession of two
very different vehicles for the expression of thought, which they put
to nearly parallel uses for general needs of communication: a simple
and very perfect alphabet, and a complex system of hieroglyphics. The
alphabet they owe to the Buddhist priests, missionaries, who took the
idea of letters from their sacred books, and developed the Korean
symbols for the writing of tracts and prayers; the hieroglyphics came
from the mother country and civilizer, China.
The needs of a simpler mode of writing for the intelligent,
non-literary classes of Japan, had led in that country to a similar
development; but there progress stopped at a syllabary, and the
alphabetic stage was not reached.
Until within the past few years the development of accurate maps and
charts of Korea has been retarded, partly from a lack of reliable
information concerning Korean proper names, and partly from the
absence of systematic surveys of the coast. Very recently, however,
the difficulties of map making have been considerably lessened through
the efforts of students of the Korean language, who have developed
exact systems of transliteration, by the application of which the
sounds of Korean proper names may be correctly expressed in our own
letters. At the present day it would seem possible, therefore, to fix,
by common consent, upon a general, systematic orthography for Korean
proper names, to be used upon the charts prepared by all those nations
employing Roman letters; and this without serious danger of clashing
with previously developed national systems, or having to undo much
work done by others.
The system of transliteration developed by Mr. E. M. Satow, of the
British Diplomatic Service, which has been put to practical use by
that gentleman in his work entitled "List of Korean Geographical
Names," would seem well adapted to meet future needs. It gives a
simple series of equivalents for Korean sounds, and is remarkably free
from diacritical marks. Mr. Satow's system has recently been employed
by English and German authors, while efforts to extend its application
would seem to have met thus far with no opposition.
The French system of transliteration, which antedates the one above
referred to, was developed by the French Roman Catholic Missionaries
in Korea, and has been employed by them in their admirable works the
"Grammaire Coréenne" and the "Dictionnaire Coréen," by far the most
important yet prepared upon the language, and the first given to the
outer world. The missionaries aimed at reproducing native speech, and
to this end faithfully copied symbols representing shades of sound
that are not to be appreciated by the foreign ear, and which in fact
are often neglected in conversation by the Koreans of the present
day--for the Ön-mun, or native alphabet, has long since lost its
purely phonetic character. The simplicity of the French system is
marred, therefore, by the use of a multiplicity of letters, which,
appearing in the form of aggregations of consonants or of vowels, are
more apt to mislead than to guide.
Inasmuch as the proper names upon native maps, which are invariably
written in the Chinese, may be correctly rendered into English,
whereas attempts at the systematic transliteration of Chinese
characters have generally failed, it may be well to allude to the
points of difference in the two cases. The possibility of the
transliteration of Korean depends upon the following: (1) that the
Korean pronunciation of Chinese characters is independent of the pitch
of the voice or _tone_; (2) that the native alphabet is especially
constructed with a view to the easy reproduction of the Korean
pronunciation of the same; (3) that the Korean pronunciation of these
characters is quite uniform throughout the whole extent of the
country; (4) that the Korean equivalents may be readily transliterated
into English. All that is necessary, therefore, in fixing a geographic
name is to have it written correctly in Chinese and in the Ön-mun.
From the latter the English equivalent may be readily obtained. The
need of the Chinese form arises from the fact that but few of the
natives spell correctly, while many of them write Chinese well; so
that it becomes necessary to refer both writings to some authority, by
whom the native spelling may be verified.
Wide spread as is the use of the Chinese nomenclature, it is none the
less evident that the system is an artificial one, and that its
employment must end somewhere. In those parts of the country that are
the least explored, and where educational facilities are wanting, in
the mountain fastnesses of the north, and among the many islands of
the Yellow Sea, important geographic names occur that possess no
Chinese equivalents: native words capable of being written only in the
Ön-mun and which derive their origin from local peculiarities. To
ascertain these correctly the services of an educated Korean are
required; and it may be added here that no surveying party on the
Korean coast should be without the services of a native guide, capable
of speaking a few words of English. Such a man may be picked up at an
open port. He would be useful in many ways: in preventing the
destruction of signals from superstitious motives by the natives; in
ascertaining from fishermen the existence of dangers in the intricate
coast waters; in marking the position of towns and villages not to be
seen from their sea approaches; and in securing supplies of fresh
provisions.
The preliminary study of the geography of an eastern country
necessitates the comparative examination of data gathered from widely
different sources: the early partial surveys of the coasts by
mariners, and the rough maps made by the natives themselves. Inasmuch
as large sections of the Korean coasts are as yet hardly examined, and
since it is only within the last few years that foreigners have been
allowed to penetrate into the interior, it follows that no accurate
map of the land exists. In selecting bases for future developments it
becomes necessary, therefore, to examine the various approximate
representations, and to determine which of them is best adapted to aid
the work in hand.
Many writers upon Korea seem prone to attribute the mapping of the
country to the result of explorations and observations made by
foreigners. I believe this assumption to be erroneous and think it can
be readily proven that, although the Koreans may have known
practically nothing of the outside world up to the time of the
treaties, some twenty years ago, they had, nevertheless, long before
this formed an excellent idea of the configuration of their own
country. The first important work accomplished by outsiders was the
survey of the common boundary of Korea and China by the Jesuits,
acting under the orders of the Chinese Emperor Kang-hsi, in the year
1709. Severity of climate and roughness of country prevented the party
from making more than a preliminary examination of the districts that
they passed through, but a few fair determinations of latitude and
approximations to longitude were obtained, and the general direction
of the boundary determined. With the aid of these data, supplemented
by information from native sources, a map was constructed, in which
the Korean peninsula was connected with the general system of the
world's coördinates and proper names were given in our own alphabetic
characters. This map, which forms the basis of most of the
representations of Korea in use at the present day, shows its origin
in the transliteration of proper names in accordance with the Mandarin
Chinese and not the Korean pronunciation of the Chinese characters
employed to represent them.
The information from Korean sources which the missionaries must have
utilized in completing their work was doubtless attained by them in
the form of native maps. Of these there are several good ones in use
at the present day, two of which would seem especially worthy of
notice: (1) the large map of twenty sheets dividing the peninsula into
sections by parallel lines drawn from east to west, and (2) a map
giving the country in eight sheets, by provinces. The key to the
latter, showing the entire kingdom, as well as one of the expanded
sheets showing the Kyöngsang province in the southeast, and the
Nakdong river, the most important stream of the land, are appended to
this paper, and will serve to indicate the progress independently
attained by the Koreans in the art of map making. These plates have
been reproduced from a copy of an original now in the possession of
Mgr. J. G. Blanc, the French Missionary Bishop of Korea, to whom it
served as an accurate guide at the time of his perilous entry into the
country, fifteen years ago, during a period of severe persecutions.
[Illustration: KOREA.]
[Illustration: Province of KYÖNG-SANG-DO]
The preface of the Korean geographer, which is written in Chinese upon
one of the sheets, is of interest, as it illustrates the object of the
work, enumerates the classes of data utilized and alludes to
difficulties contended with. I therefore quote it here.
"The geographies of my country are quite numerous, but all maps are
influenced to a certain extent by the limit of the paper employed in
their construction, and so distances are very incorrectly given. Thus
ten or more ri (Korean unit of distance--about 2/5-mile) are sometimes
represented as two or three hundred ri; while sometimes two or three
hundred ri are represented as two or three. The bearings given are
also incorrect. Such a map offers great disadvantages to people who
attempt to learn about their country. Therefore I have taken all care
in constructing this one, both as to direction and distances of
places, as well as to the situations of mountains and rivers. For
distances I have made a scale in which one hundred ri are taken as one
ja (Korean foot), and ten ri as one poun (Korean inch, ten to the
foot). I have laid off distances in all directions from the capital,
so that the general shape and position of the eight provinces are
correctly represented. The islands, however, are only placed in
direction with reference to the provinces to which they belong,
without regard to actual distances. Where mountain ranges and rivers
are represented as boundaries, they are necessarily repeated upon the
sheets of adjoining provinces. In the measurement of distances one ja
represents one hundred ri in level places, and from one hundred and
twenty to one hundred and thirty ri where the mountains are high."
The assumption that the unit of scale represents an increased distance
in mountainous regions is a peculiarity of Chinese as well as of
Korean maps. Travelers who employ either are obliged in estimating
days' journeys to consider the character of the country ahead before
applying the unit of measurement.
An examination of the various conventional features of Plate I and II
will afford much information concerning the official subdivision of
the country for governmental purposes, and will serve to indicate the
facilities of communication that exist in a country where there are no
railroads, and where almost every important route extends in a
direction normal to that of the flow of the greater number of rivers.
The eight provinces of the kingdom are exhibited upon Plate I as
groups of towns, each group being displayed upon the original in a
different color, all of which, as shades of various intensities, are
fairly well reproduced upon the photo-lithographs. Each town is
denoted by a circle of very exaggerated dimensions, large enough to
allow its name to be written in Chinese characters in the enclosed
area. The apparent multiplicity of characters upon the present map is
due to the fact that all names are given in the native Ön-mun, as well
as in the Chinese. The employment of the former is unusual and in the
present case was resorted to at my own instance, in order to render
the map more generally useful to foreigners. Each town is the seat of
government of an officer who is subordinate to a provincial governor.
The strength of any portion of Korea may therefore be reckoned in the
native way as so many "cities," by the word "city," being understood
both the seat of government and the adjacent lands over which the
governor holds sway. The walled towns, which are quite uniform in type
throughout the whole extent of the country, deserve especial mention.
They are represented on the map as circles with serrated edges, and a
glance at the provincial sheets will show that they are quite
numerous, each province possessing from six to twenty of them. The
number is greatest along the coast of the Yellow Sea and to the
southward, facing Japan.
As secondary fortifications may be mentioned the San-söng, or mountain
walls, as they are called, built at the least accessible points of the
interior ranges, generally in proximity to some thickly settled
district. The more ancient are relics of the feudal period, when Korea
was governed by petty princes each with his castle upon a rock; the
more modern, witnesses of the Japanese invasion of two hundred years
ago, when they were either pillaged by the enemy or else held by the
people as places of refuge. A number of the San-söng are marked upon
the present map; those of lesser importance are omitted.
Not the least curious among Korean institutions is the system of
communication maintained at the present time. At the yok, or post
stations, represented on the map by diminutive circles, are kept
numbers of the small active native horses, well fed and in good
condition, attended by staffs of native couriers who are ready to
receive orders from the station-master and spring into saddle upon a
moment's notice. The service is well patronized and the couriers
frequently employed, partly at the instance of the government, who
desire to promote the efficiency of the system, and partly owing to
the general accumulation of private needs of various kinds. A letter
or parcel is thus rapidly transmitted from relay to relay, moving
onward by day and night--except in certain mountainous districts of
the north, where the fear of the tiger prevents night travel. Supplies
of fruit and game for the royal table are forwarded in this manner to
the capital from the most distant parts of the kingdom.
The pong-wa, or signal-fire stations, are indicated upon the map by
small squares placed at the summit of the mountains. They are
especially numerous in the coast districts, where their sites are
chosen with great care, in such manner that the fires that are lighted
at each station at night-fall may be observed at some advanced point
of the interior, whence a single fire may be again flashed on, to form
a member of a more extended group. And so the lights proceed,
re-collected and re-forwarded until the final combinations are
gathered into a final group at the capital, to show that all is well
throughout the kingdom.
The faint network of lines extending over the whole country, as shown
in the map of the southeastern province, represents the chief public
highways, upon the determination of whose length and relative bearing
the development of the map is based. In general, roads in Korea are
well maintained, and during the greater part of the year are in fair
condition. It would be found impossible to take a wheeled vehicle of
any kind over them, however; for such use they are not intended,
travel in Korea being performed afoot, or with the aid of horse or
sedan. During the summer rains the streams rise rapidly; the waters
pour down from the mountains, each rivulet becomes a torrent and the
bridges are swept away. When the floods subside the local authorities
compel the peasants to turn out in force and make the necessary
repairs; delays of travel are thus reduced to a minimum.
Korea is preëminently a mountainous country. With the exception of the
alluvial plains at the mouths of the rivers, low ranges of mountains
with narrow intervening valleys are found everywhere, and are
characteristic. The main chain, forming the back-bone of the
peninsula, is not clearly defined, as it is formed principally by the
overlappings and intersections of minor chains, so that it is quite
irregular as to direction, but a glance at the sources of the rivers,
considered with reference to the intervening line of water-sheds,
shows that it springs from the mountains of Siberia at the north,
follows for some distance the line of the eastern coast and then
strikes inland, trending to the southward and westward until it
reaches the shores of the Yellow Sea. The loftiest ranges, therefore,
are in the northern and eastern provinces. At the centre of the
northern boundary is Paik-du-san, the "white-headed mountain," in
whose slopes rise the Yalu, Tuman, and Songari rivers, the two former
defining the western and eastern sections of the frontier, the latter
a tributary of the Amur, an important stream of southern Siberia.
According to Messrs. James, Younghusband, and Fulford, of the British
Indian and Consular services, who visited it in May, 1886, Paik-du-san
is "a recently extinct volcano with a lovely pellucid lake filling the
bottom of the crater, surmounted by a serrated edge of peaks rising
about 650 feet above the surface of the water. The height of the
loftiest of these was found to be about 7,525 feet above the level of
the sea."
Besides the rivers of the frontier are others of the interior that
deserve a passing mention. The mountainous nature of the country, as
well as its proximity to the sea, implies the existence of numerous
secondary water courses, but these as a rule are insignificant in size
and so shallow as to permit of navigation only throughout limited
portions of their extent. Among the larger streams that lie wholly
within the country is the Taidong, flowing through Phyöng-an-do, the
northwestern province, rising in the central ranges of the peninsula
and flowing into the Yellow Sea. During the greater part of the year
it is navigable as far as the city of Phyöngyang for native craft of
the largest size. In midsummer its waters rise rapidly during a short
rainy season; then quickly subside, the river resuming its former
limits. To this sudden shoaling may be attributed the loss of the
schooner Sherman, captured by the Koreans in 1871, the vessel going
aground without warning at a place where a few hours before abundant
water had been found.
The Han, the river of the capital, lies about one hundred miles to the
southward of the Taidong, and flows westwardly in a nearly parallel
direction thereto, from the central ranges of the peninsula into the
Yellow Sea. Its many branches join in a common estuary near the centre
of the Yellow Sea coast, and their collective drainage area comprises
a large portion of central Korea. Still farther to the southward is
the Keum, traversing a fertile rice-growing country, while at the
extreme south is the Nakdong. The latter is one of the most important
streams of Korea, and the facilities that it affords for communication
and interchange have done much towards rendering the district through
which it flows one of the most fertile and prosperous of the land.
The coasts of Korea are forbidding to the mariner and seem well
adapted for the preservation of the seclusion that it has been so long
the national policy to maintain. On the east, facing Japan, unbroken
lines of steep hills, void of harbors, bend abruptly into the deep
waters of the Japan Sea. To the westward countless outlying islands
extend seaward many miles, liberally interspersed with rocks and
shoals, between which eddy swift streams of tide-water. The terrors of
the Maelstrom would find their counterpart in many a Korean whirlpool,
which, forming in the vicinity of some submerged ledge, will cause a
large vessel to heel suddenly well over, and will swing her many
points off her course in a way to make the stoutest hearted captain
tremble for the safety of his charge.
The climate of Korea exhibits wide ranges of temperatures and
hygroscopic conditions. In the northeast province, Ham-kiung-do, the
winter is as rigorous as that of Nova Scotia; at the extreme south, on
the island of Quelpaert, it somewhat resembles that of Louisiana. The
warmth of Quelpaert is due to the proximity of the Kura-siwo, or Black
Stream of Japan, the Gulf Stream of the Pacific, part of which is here
turned into a cul-de-sac, from which it escapes with difficulty. One
result of this is the creation of a stormy region near the island,
where the mariner may at all times look for a hard blow. A
characteristic feature of Yellow Sea coasts are the Chang-ma, or
mid-summer rains, which set in with fair regularity in July and during
their month's duration resemble in phenomena and general effects the
periodic rains of the tropics. The winters, in all but the southern
parts of the country, are long and severe and set in with great
suddenness. As an illustration of the rapidity of this change I
remember that on one occasion I was ferried across the Han river near
the capital at a time when the only indication of cold weather was a
film of ice along the river banks, and that within forty-eight hours
afterwards I rode back across the river ice on horseback, over the
line of the former ferry.
Careful meteorologic records have now been kept at the open ports for
more than five years; at Che-mul-po, on the Yellow Sea (the seaport of
the capital, Söul); at Fusan, to the south; and at Gensan, to the
northeast. Stations are needed on the Yellow Sea coast farther to the
northward, at the extreme northeast, at points in the interior, and
especially on the island of Cheju, or Quelpaert, whose weather reports
may some day prove as valuable to the Japanese as those from Bermuda
would now be to the navigator of the western waters of the Atlantic.
All the above mentioned places are easily accessible and doubtless
soon will receive attention. In fact, to the navigator of these
regions this island of Quelpaert is almost of the importance that
Hatteras is to the navigator of our own coast.
As an important factor of Korea's future prosperity, and one that will
enter largely into the determination of her future position among the
nations of the east, may be mentioned her mineral resources. These yet
remain in an almost undeveloped condition. The most easily accessible
deposits and out-croppings, which are worked by the natives in
primitive ways, afford evidence of an abundant and varied supply of
the useful ores and minerals widely distributed throughout the whole
extent of the land. Many localities, moreover, are well known to the
people for their especial products. Thus the Phyöngyang province, in
the northwest, facing China, possesses abundant deposits of coal,
iron, and lime. Samples of this coal, which is but little used by the
people, were collected several years ago from twelve different
localities, and I remember that some of the Phyöngyang gatherings were
tested on board the U. S. S. Alert, but were found to have suffered so
greatly from exposure to the weather as to be comparatively valueless,
even for experimental purposes. Limestone is common in this district,
and in the town of Phyöngyang I have noticed the use of caustic lime
in the streets as a disinfectant. The iron produced at Yöngpyön, fifty
miles to the northward of this city, which is reduced in the native
way with charcoal, is remarkable for its malleability and purity.
Inasmuch as all these deposits are of very great extent and lie near
the sea coast, and in proximity to waters easily navigable by larger
craft, it may be assumed as probable that the time will soon arrive
when the iron of Korea will largely supply the ship-yards and machine
shops of northern China. Silver is found in at least four localities;
copper is worked in paying quantities in two; galena is widely
distributed; and zincblende has been found near the capital. Sulphur
is said to occur in Kyöng-sang-do; no ore of mercury is known to the
Koreans, who import their supplies of the metal and its preparations
from China.
At the time of the opening of Korea by treaty, 1870-80, an impression
seems to have prevailed quite generally that the country was extremely
rich in gold, that great quantities of the precious metals were soon
to be exported, or that mines of great richness would be found and
worked. The years that have elapsed since this date have partly served
to prove the fallacy of these assumptions, yet the doubt is not yet
fully removed. Gold is now known to occur in many places in moderate
quantities: in alluvial deposits, from which it may be washed by
simple mechanical process, and in quartz veins, from which it is
extracted in small quantities by crude and laborious methods of
rock-pulverizing and washing. A small constant demand for the metal
has always existed, for jewelry and gilding--the latter quite a common
decorative process, which up to the present seems to have required the
use of pure gold even for the crudest applications. The mines remain
for the greater part unworked, however, for three reasons: (1) the
native dislike for altering the geomantic conditions of any locality
by digging holes in the ground; (2) the laws forbidding the search for
the metal, for gold mining in Korea is a government monopoly; (3) the
inability of the peasants to find a market for the gold that they
surreptitiously work. There has always existed a chance of disposing
of it by crossing the border into China, and there has probably long
been a small steady export in this way; and a port has been opened
near the capital where reside Chinese and Japanese merchants who must
find a way of converting the Korean copper cash into some medium of
exchange easily negotiable abroad, and who for this purpose have been
known to purchase gold from the Koreans at a considerable premium. I
have examined a number of specimens of Korean gold which had been
brought to Che-mul-po and had passed into the hands of foreign
merchants there. In several cases I found small pieces of quartz
clinging to flat laminated grains of the metal of considerable size.
In answer to inquiries that I made from time to time during a
residence of more than a year in Korea I was told by the Koreans of a
number of localities where gold was supposed to be abundant. I have
endeavored to show these collectively upon a small map (Fig. III)
giving the Korean names of the towns and districts with their English
equivalents and the names of the provinces of the kingdom in which the
places are situated. I was told repeatedly that the metal was most
plentiful at Tan-chhön, in the Ham-kiung province. Concerning this
locality our Korean geographer says, "at Ma-un, west of Tan-chhön,
much gold is found. The mountains there are lofty and precipitous."
[Illustration: Fig. III]
THE ORDNANCE SURVEY OF GREAT BRITAIN--ITS HISTORY AND OBJECT.
BY JOSIAH PIERCE, JR.
I. THE INSTITUTION OF NATIONAL SURVEYS.
The earliest surveys were not laid down as maps but consisted of
catalogues of property which are called "terriers;" of these the
Domesday Book is the earliest extant. Had the art of surveying been
properly understood at the time of the Norman conquest there would
probably have been a Saxon cadastre along with the Domesday Book,
which was ordered by William the Conquerer in the year 1085.
"After this had the king a very large meeting, and a very deep
consultation with his council about this land, how it was occupied,
and by what sort of men. Then sent he his men all over England, into
each shire, commissioning them to find out 'how many hundreds of hides
were in the shire; what land the king himself had, and what stock upon
the land, or what dues he ought to have by the year from the shire.'
Also he commissioned them to record in writing, 'How much land his
archbishops had, and his diocesan bishops, and his abbots, and his
earls; and though I may be prolix and tedious, what and how much each
man had, who was the occupier of land in England, either in money or
in stock, and how much money it was worth.' So very narrowly indeed
did he commission them to trace it out, that there was not a single
hide nor a yard of land (the fourth part of an acre), nay, moreover,
(it is shameful to tell, though he thought it no shame to do it) not
even an ox, a cow, or a swine was there left, that was not set down in
his writ, and all the recorded particulars were afterwards brought to
him."--_Saxon Chronicle, by Ingram_.
The publication of the Domesday Book was ordered first by George III.
in 1767, and completed in 1783. After the discovery of the art of
photozincography it was reproduced "in facsimile" in 1864-5, under the
direction of Lieut.-Gen'l. Sir Henry James, then director of the
Ordnance Survey.
Little change (in the art of mensuration or surveying) seems to have
been made until the early part of the 17th century when simple
boundary line maps accompanied the terriers of the surveys made in
Ireland in 1634, by order of Lord Stafford, then viceroy. Great
improvements were introduced about that time in Sweden by Gustavus
Adolphus, which must have become known to Cromwell, for in 1654, the
"Down Survey," as it was called, comprised maps of the townlands, and
baronies over two-thirds of the surface of Ireland, that is,
comprehending about 20,000,000 of English acres.
It may not be uninteresting or irrelevant to bestow a few remarks upon
the development and methods of surveying in the seventeenth century,
many of which have descended with little modification to the present
day.
When man first conceived the idea of owning real property the art of
geometry or surveying became a necessity. Interest in other worlds
than our own, and the measurement of time, led to the development of
the science of astronomy, and of graduated instruments for measuring
angles. Many of the most refined modern instruments are but slight
modifications of original Arabian models, and the practice of linear
surveying, or the subdivision of land into triangles, and geometrical
figures, whose area could be computed, has been carried on without
modification for centuries.
The greatest development took place after the introduction of
artillery in the methods and instruments used for trigonometrical
surveying or range-finding. Every principle which is to-day known and
applied in the construction and use of modern trigonometrical
surveying instruments can be traced in a modified form to the
construction and application of the instruments of the sixteenth and
seventeenth centuries.
In the practice of artillery, the first important question is the
distance or range of the enemy. As in war it was clearly impossible to
obtain the same by direct linear measurement, instruments were devised
for measuring the range trigonometrically, all based on the
calculation of a single triangle, the base and two angles of which
could be measured. These instruments were simply modified to the
extent of furnishing in the instrument itself a constant base or angle
so that only one or at most two measurements were necessary.
The one instrument that has received the greatest development in the
modern type is the quadrant, a simple graduated arc from whose center
was suspended a plumb-line, or which carried a movable arm with raised
sights for measuring horizontal or inclined angles. This arm has
retained the name alhidada derived from the Arabic.
Such was the trigonometrical instrument used by the earliest
navigators and astronomers for determining latitudes, and by surveyors
and artillerists for finding ranges.
In the latter part of the 16th century Thomas Digges, surveyor and
author, conceived the idea of combining two such graduated arcs in one
instrument, the one placed horizontally and the other in a vertical
plane, the whole supported on a rigid stand or tripod, and he called
the same his _Theodolitus_, which is said by DeMorgan to have been the
origin of the name of the modern instrument.
In the earliest books in the practice of artillery and of surveying,
the crescent of the dreaded Moor appears in the woodcuts illustrating
range finding or trigonometrical surveying generally floating over the
tower of some captured castle or town, which it is desired to bombard.
This clearly demonstrated that the chief use of trigonometrical
instruments was for military purposes.
Among the instruments of surveying of this period which became
practically obsolete in England in the present century, but which is
most widely used elsewhere, is the plane-table, unquestionably one of
the earliest instruments invented for measuring or recording angles.
At the period 1570, when the Germans claim that it was invented by
Pretorius, a professor of the University of Nuremburg, it was
unquestionably in use in England, and it is mentioned by Thomas
Digges, in his _Pantometria_, published in 1590, as a platting
instrument for such as are ignorant of arithmetical calculations. On
the relative merits of the theodolite and plane table authorities
still differ.
Throughout Europe great activity in the development of the practical
applications of geometry soon followed the exchange of ideas brought
about by the introduction of printing.
Side by side with the important geographical discoveries of the age
came the minor improvements in scientific instruments which rendered
national surveys and geodetic operations possible at a later period.
With trifling modifications the instruments devised by Durer, Newton,
and Gallileo are in common use to-day.
Gradual improvements can be traced in the application of surveying to
military and civil purposes, to mapping the campaigns of Louis XIV.
and Marlborough, and laying down the forfeited estates in Ireland by
William III., until in 1729 the first national survey on a large
scale, for public and private purposes, was commenced in Savoy and
Piedmont by Victor Amadie II., whereon nine years were occupied.
The method of large surveys obtained the name of Cadastre (Terrier
map). It was suggested for France in 1763, but was only commenced in
that country in 1793. The exact derivation and meaning of the French
term "cadastre" are not free from dispute. Some authorities refer it
to the verb "cadrer" to square or correspond with, all objects on a
large scale, plan, or cadastre being shown in their true position and
proportions, whereas in a mere topographical map similar accuracy is
impossible, and certain features must need be exaggerated for the sake
of distinctness.
The _Dictionaire des Dictionaires_ on the other hand derives
_cadastre_ (formerly capdastre) from the mediæval-Latin word
capitastrum (from caput "head," because formerly people were taxed,
and afterwards property) and defines it as "a public register,
containing the quantity and value of landed property, names of owners,
etc., and which serves for the assessment of the tax on property in
proportion to its revenue."
In the _Recueil des Lois et Instructions sur les contributions
directes_, the _cadastre_ is defined as "a plan from which the area of
land may be computed, and from which its revenue may be valued."
This, there is no doubt, is the sense in which the word is used on the
Continent, while in England it is taken as denoting generally a survey
on a large scale.
It was not until long after the organization of the Ordnance Survey
that it became a cadastral survey. Its organization at first was
distinctly for military purposes, and the extension of its operations
to cover all national needs only attained after years of discussion,
and struggle for existence.
The credit of originating and carrying into execution the first
tangible project for a systematic topographical survey of part of the
kingdom is divided between two engineer officers, both at the time
holding distinguished positions on the staff of the British army. The
idea would seem to have followed close upon the sanguinary termination
at Culloden of the "forty-five" rebellion, by which the fate of the
house of Stuart was decided, in the reign of George the Second.
It was doubtless the outcome of that unhappy rising for it
contemplated a general map of the Scottish highlands, precisely those
parts of the country in which the heart and soul of the
insurrectionary movement had all along centered. The difficulties of
moving troops through these wild mountain districts, and without any
clear knowledge of the passes connecting the glens and fastnesses, or
of the correct distances intervening, would have been enormously
lessened by the possession of good maps.
The survey of this wild and inaccessible region was undertaken in 1747
by Lieutenant-General Watson, an engineer, ably assisted by William
Roy, who afterwards played a distinguished part in the earlier
geodetic work of the Ordnance Survey.
The map, at first intended to be confined to the Highlands only, was
at last extended to the Lowlands and thus made general in what related
to the mainland of Scotland, the islands (except some lesser ones near
the coast), not having been surveyed.
It is spoken of by Lieutenant-Colonel White, in his excellent book on
the Ordnance Survey, as a "piece of work which appears to have been
excellently carried out as far as it went, qualified by the remark of
Roy that owing to the comparative inferiority of the instruments used
and the inadequacy of the annual grants provided for the survey it is
rather to be considered as a magnificent military sketch than a very
accurate map of the country."
The survey of Scotland was interrupted by the breaking out in 1755 of
another of England's intermittent wars with France, that which gained
her Canada, and the work was never completed.
"On the conclusion of the peace of 1763," writes General Roy, "it came
for the first time under the consideration of government to make a
general survey of the whole island at the public cost." But, for
reasons not assigned, the twelve years' interval of peace before the
outbreak in 1775 of the American War of Independence was allowed to
pass away without anything being done. There the matter remained in
abeyance until, after renewed hostilities with France and Spain, peace
was negotiated in 1783.
The trigonometrical survey of Great Britain may be said to have been
begun one hundred and six years ago.
Astronomers of that day were desirous that the difference of longitude
between the Greenwich and Paris observatories should be ascertained by
trigonometrical measurement; and under the auspices of the king and of
the Royal Society, General Roy, R. E., in April, 1784, began the task
by the measurement of a base line on Hounslow Heath which was to serve
as the starting point of a series of triangles to be extended to Dover
and across the channel.
This work was carried out, a connection with the French triangulation
being established in 1786.
Soon after this the government decided on having a general survey made
of the entire kingdom, on the scale of one inch to one mile for
military purposes, and General Roy's triangulation in the southeastern
counties became the basis of the Great Triangulation, which was
gradually extended over the whole of the British Isles and finished in
1853.
The one-inch survey was carried northward through England and Wales
under the successive superintendence of artillery and engineer
officers, and by 1824 had reached the southern borders of Yorkshire
and Lincolnshire.
At this time it became necessary that a survey of Ireland should be
made on a large scale as a basis for general land valuation. On the
recommendation of Colonel Colby, then director, the scale of six
inches to one mile was agreed upon; the work in England was suspended
and the force transferred to Ireland.
It appears from a report of Colonel Colby, in 1840, that the purposes
for which the English and Irish surveys were designed were gradually
developed and not all originally known.
The principal triangulation, on which the survey of South Britain had
been based, was partly designed for astronomical purposes, and partly
for a map on small scale.
The detail plans were commenced by officers of the Royal Engineers,
partly for the purpose of practicing them in military drawing, and
partly for the purpose of making plans for the use of the Ordnance.
The publication of some parts of this map on the scale of one inch to
one mile created a desire among the public to possess better maps than
had formerly existed.
This led to the employment of civilian surveyors to advance the
progress of the map, and it was found necessary at great additional
expense, to revise and correct these contract plans.
The work did not possess the accuracy demanded by the admiralty in
forming the basis of their coast surveys for the Geological Survey or
the civil engineers. As a military map its publication during war was
suspended, and its continuance became a matter of doubt in time of
peace.
At one time the gentlemen of Lincolnshire and Rutlandshire proposed to
the government to proceed with the map of their district out of its
regular turn, upon condition of their becoming subscribers for a
certain number of copies. These gentlemen partly wished for the map
for their use in hunting, and partly for the improvement of the
country in marking out the drainage of the fens.
Prejudices existed, which could be traced back to the Norman conquest
and Domesday Survey--against the right of a surveyor to enter a
private estate, and in the early contract plans for the English maps
the surveyors neglected the survey of the lesser streams, to obviate
the inconvenience of trespassing and to save themselves trouble.
These were some of the causes of delay, expense and insufficiency
which had operated against the earlier surveys.
The survey of Ireland began in 1825 under far more favorable
circumstances than the Ordnance map of England and Wales. The
triangulation commenced from a more accurate baseline than any
preceding triangulation, and was designed to serve as a basis for any
future survey in any scale, however large.
The House of Commons passed an act defining its principal object,
prescribing a legal mode for ascertaining the boundaries which were to
be surveyed, granting the surveyors power to enter lands for the
purposes of the survey, and preventing the removal of the objects
used.
The earlier methods of military surveying were abandoned, and new
instruments and a system were devised for its execution.
It is important to note that the organization of the Irish survey
marked an important epoch in the history of the Ordnance Survey, viz:
its change from a topographic to a cadastral survey.
In Ireland, subordinate to the parishes, there is an internal division
of smaller denomination called townlands, which are very frequently,
but not uniformly, conterminous with property.
The townland was the lowest unit of taxation for country purposes, of
an average size of 200 or 300 acres, and originally the map was to be
simply a topographic map, containing the boundaries of the townlands,
the roads, the streams and the houses, with a view to the valuation of
Ireland for the county assessment. The six inch was considered to be
the smallest scale that could be available for that purpose.
There was no intention in the original Irish survey to insert the
fields, but when the valuation began, it was found by the valuators
that additional minuteness was necessary to enable them to subdivide
the townlands into the qualities of lands of which they consisted, and
more especially that the boundary between the cultivated and
uncultivated portions ought to be inserted on the maps with great
accuracy.
This rendered necessary a very extensive revision which was undertaken
in 1830, and it became a survey by fields instead of townlands.
This was clearly a wide and most important departure from the original
intention of the six inch survey in Ireland, and it is not to be
doubted that General Colby, who would not trust to paper measurements
for the areas of entire townlands, would have adopted at the very
outset, for his manuscript plans of these minute subdivisions, a scale
much larger than that of six inches to one mile.
The engraving of the six inch survey appears to have resulted from a
demand for six copies of one sheet for valuation purposes when it was
found that it would be as cheap to engrave it as to make that number
of copies.
So valuable did the six inch map of Ireland prove for many purposes
over and above that for which it had been originally designed, that,
in 1840, when the Irish survey was completed, and that of England
resumed, the Government gave their consent to the adoption of the same
scale for the unsurveyed parts of Great Britain.
By 1851, Yorkshire, Lancashire, the Isle of Lewis, and several
counties in the south of Scotland were finished on the six inch scale.
Then began that long controversy which has been well termed the
"battle of the scales" and which for eleven or twelve years retarded
the progress of the survey and led to a large waste of public money.
During the time that the Ordnance Surveyors were engaged in making
their six inch map of Lancashire and Yorkshire they were called upon
and employed to make, at the expense of the land owners, twenty-three
plans of parishes and townships on the scale of twenty-six and 2/3
inches to one mile for tithe commutation.
It was even found that the plan of London, made for the Metropolitan
Commissioners of Sewers, on the scale of sixty inches or five feet to
one mile was inapplicable to house drainage within the area.
Between 1851 and 1852 no fewer than three select committees and one
royal commission deliberated on the scale for the survey, and fourteen
blue books were presented to Parliament.
The main point of the controversy was whether the six inch or some
larger scale was best fitted for the national map. A host of persons
eminent in science were consulted on the subject, and a great
diversity of opinion was found to exist, the weight of evidence,
however, inclining by a majority of four to one, to a scale of from 20
to 26-2/3 inches to a mile.
In 1853 a statistical conference held at Brussels and attended by
twenty-six delegates from the chief States of Europe considered the
question of national maps or cadastres, and pronounced unanimously in
favor of a scale of 1/2500th of nature equivalent to about 25-1/3
inches to a mile, recommending at the same time that the cadastre on
this scale should be accompanied by a more general map on the scale of
1/10,000 equivalent to about six 1/3 inches to a mile, and thus very
nearly corresponding to the six inch scale of the Ordnance Survey.
The scale finally adopted of 1/2500, on which the whole of England has
at last been surveyed, is one which corresponds with that adopted for
the national maps and plans of the chief countries for Europe. Lastly
it possessed the incidental advantage that a square acre is to all
practical intents represented on the plans by a square inch.