Map interlude

bravo1102 on Aug. 30, 2017

Accurate map making requires a lot of instruments that the pre-modern world would be at great pains to duplicate. Surveying land and accurately recording its topography is different from laying out the Pyramids, great temples or even whole ancient cities. Look at early maps and they are crude drawings with vague indication of terrain and little idea of straight line distance. Travel is not measured in miles but time. It will take you three days to get there, not “it's 65 miles away”.

Unless there is a strong central authority to build them, roads are haphazard trails meandering from one center of habitation to another. Enterprising souls may pace out a journey and put a rest stop at what they figure is the end of a day's journey. Depending on where it is, it may become a village or town or not. But regular way stations for a relay message service or to supply an army? What do you think this is, the Roman or Mongol Empire? Empires do that to lay claim to land. The earliest empire known to have done it were the Hittites.

So Halfdan has nothing like this map in his possession. There are a handful of proper geographies and map collections but they are not for itinerant Norsemen. King Falkimir and other crowned heads have collections for campaigns and the pleasure house that employed the teen-aged Searsha had an astounding library including maps of the western hemisphere and the far eastern lands brought in by travelers as payment for services rendered. Falkimir's maps are in fact copies of those. In the pre-modern world information of distant places could be more valuable than gold or silver. Prostitutes, especially the high-priced courtesan were wonderful ways to collect information. And among that information would be books and maps.

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As noted the actual road Halfdan refers to isn't even on this map. It's a cart trail. You go to a town where you know it starts and you follow it until you get where you want to go. Directions would be like “Go a day East from Ack, then pick up the Pithmor-north road by the river.” This isn't a AAA triptych.

As a little aside, Ack is best known its inns. There is The Orange Cat Inn. There's also the Tongue Cheer Tavern (locally known as the thhbbt!) The sign is a person sticking his tongue out with spit flying all over. The third is Big Nose Bird which has a puffin on its signboard. The North Atlantic Puffin is not an uncommon sight in the Northern Parts of Narthatheia. Can you tell what was popular reading when I came up with this place?