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Presenting items 1 to 14 of 14 total selection(s) for Africa Antique Maps
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Africa antique maps represent the slow unfolding of discovery by European and other explorers. Although the Greeks and Romans made many forays into Africa it is the Portuguese capture in 1415 of the port of Ceuta in present day Spain that is recognized as the modern European attempt at expansion into Africa. From that time forward the race was on between the major powers of Europe to colonize and map Africa. Gold and slaves were the early bounty. Old vintage maps and charts of Africa show the advance of knowledge attained. First the coastal areas such as Algeria, Nigeria and South Africa were mapped and later the interior areas of Congo, Sudan and Botswana. It is surprising to note that much of the interior regions of Africa were not fully mapped until the late nineteenth century. In 1497 Vasco da Gama rounds the Cape of Good Hope giving Europe an all water route to the Indies. Ibn Battuta, James Bruce, Mungo Park, Richard Burton, David Livingstone and Henry Morton Stanley are but a few of the names that explored Africa and brought back the data we see today in antique and vintage maps of Africa. |
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