Outline Map Of Southeast Asia

Outline Map Of Southeast Asia

Outline Map Of Southeast Asia

Ptolemy, who is also known by his Latin name Claudius Ptolemaeus, was a Greek astronomer, mathematician and geographer living in Alexandria, Egypt during the second century A.D. As Alexander Raymond Jones points out in the Encyclopedia Britannica Online (2009), not much is known about Ptolemy’s life other than what historians have been able to glean from his many books. He was born some time around 100 A.D. and died in approximately 170 A.D. Most of his works were completed in the last twenty or so years of his life.

Ptolemy is most well-known for his work in astronomy. His proposal of a geocentric model of the universe was so profound at the time that it became known as the Ptolemaic system. Equally profound, however, was his contribution to the study of geography. Ptolemy’s book Guide to Geography, or Geographia, became the authoritative work on the subject, not only in the ancient world, but through the Renaissance.

Ptolemy’s Geographia

According to the collected works at ibiblio.org, Guide to Geography largely summarized and criticized the writings of earlier scholars on the subject. The book was produced in eight volumes. In the first, Ptolemy covered the basic principles of geography and map projections. In volumes two through seven, he offered the approximate latitude and longitude of about 8000 locations, collecting most of his information from older, pre-existing maps. In the last volume, he gave instructions for preparing maps of the world and information on mathematical geography and the fundamental principles of cartography. In Guide to Geography, Ptolemy also devised two methods of drawing lines of latitude and longitude on flat maps to preserve the impression of Earth’s spherical surface and proportionality of distances.