Maps

The story of cartography, or mapmaking, in the North Carolina region may have begun with the Vinland map of 1440. Although its authenticity has been questioned, the map gives ample evidence, as tested by renowned scholars, that the East Coast of the New World from Newfoundland to Cuba was visited by Europeans well before Columbus. This was when North Carolina, as it is defined today, was known as "Nova Albion."

The early maps of the area that was to become North Carolina resulted from the mapping and compilation of information of the coast by ancient mariners and explorers. Mapping and recording observations from the deck of a bouncing ship were not easy tasks. The early maps were generally nothing more than rough sketches of the coastline with latitudinal measurements taken with a backstaff, distances measured with an alidade, and depths taken with a lead line. Surveying by the more modern method of triangulation came into practice with Thomas Harriot on the second of the Raleigh voyages in 1585-86, although triangulation was used to make maps as early as 1535 by Gerhard Mercator. Early maps did not usually have longitude, nor were they very accurate, sometimes intentionally so. Still, some of the maps were quite good (especially John Smith's map of 1612).

Much of the exploration and discovery of America in the late fifteenth century and the sixteenth century was undertaken to find a shorter route to the Far East, and many maps were used to market that theme. Indeed, often a map's accuracy was secondary to its elaborate beauty. Such are the maps of the Thames School. In particular, Nicholas Comberford's map of 1657 shows a very generalized North Carolina coastline with scattered trees inland and Pamlico Sound described as a broad bay or inland sea. The Comberford map contains the earliest evidence of permanent European settlement of the region that became North Carolina. This colored manuscript map on vellum in the National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, England, is titled "The South Part of Virginia." Another one in the New York Public Library, otherwise virtually identical, has added in a later hand, "now the north part of Carolina." Shown between the Roanoke River and Salmon Creek is "Batts House," the trading post/home of Nathaniell Batts, believed to have been the first permanent settler of the colony.

By the mid-seventeenth century, maps were used to describe the virtues of America and other places of the New World. John Ogilby's atlas of America in 1671 and John Speed's map and description in 1676 are wonderful examples of early marketing. The early settlement of North Carolina, known as "Virginia" in 1675, began in the Albemarle Sound area and continued into the early 1700s. William Hack's map of 1684 shows the Appalachian Mountains, as more was being learned about the interior of America. Exploration of the interior portion of North Carolina was soon followed by settlement inland. John Lawson's map of 1709 and his surveying commentary attest to the acclimation of explorers to the landscape. More and more place names were being mapped and recorded. Place names began to appear on the maps in vastly greater density, and the descriptions on the maps were in much better detail.

In colonial times, as settlements were located more inland, explorers established trails, most of which were borrowed from the Indians. Surveyors following by foot or on horseback trotted across the frontier to divide up the land established by the king. Edward Moseley's map of 1733 added greatly to the understanding of the interior of North Carolina, as did James Wimble's 1738 map of the coast. John Collet's map of 1770 gives the names of settlers, and details such as shoals, swamps, and roads appear on the 1775 map of Henry Mouzon. Joshua Fry and Peter Jefferson's map of the same year shows the name and location of stores, ferries, and roads. The North Carolina area was finally becoming settled.

As the United States became more spatially and politically organized after the American Revolution, the government took on the responsibility of mapmaking. Surveying and mapping by the government began by act of the Continental Congress on 20 May 1785, and the Board of Engineers was created in the early 1800s. The mapping of the coasts, harbors, and rivers became very important to the government. Thus, the need for individual surveyors, mapmakers, and the like became practically obsolete in the private sector, and they moved on to do mapping in the western United States, Canada, South America, Africa, and Pacific Coast.

Mapping programs by government agencies, particularly the U.S. Geological Survey, continued throughout the twentieth century and into the twenty-first century. The U.S. Coast and Geodetic Survey had a continuous chart-updating program, and the U.S. Corps of Engineers continued its reconnaissance survey work. Major oil companies began to produce state road maps, and the North Carolina Highway Commission started its county road map series. Using these maps, Garland P. Stout researched old maps, deeds, and other records and recorded information on the North Carolina county maps. Each county map shows the location of post offices, schools, churches, gristmills, mine sites, and abandoned settlements.

Efforts to map soils began after World War I and continued throughout the century. The U.S. Soil Conservation Service, the North Carolina Soil Conservation Service, and the North Carolina Department of Natural Resources and Community Development completed the mapping program by 1978. North Carolina was also covered by U.S. Geological Survey topographic maps with the assistance of the North Carolina Department of Natural Resources and Community Development.

With the advent of satellite imagery and computerized databases, mapping in North Carolina became permanently altered by the technical revolution. Mapping is now accomplished with a computer using a geographic information system (GIS), and place names are found in the geographic names information system (GNIS).

Cartographers or Publishers of Maps of the North Carolina Area
Early Maps
1440?	Vinland
1500	Juan de la Cosa (sailed with Columbus)
1507	Martin Waldseemuller
1526	Juan Vespucci (nephew of Amerigo Vespucci)
1529	Diego Ribero (or Diogo Ribeiro)
1529	Giovanni da Verrazano (from voyage in 1524)
1538	Gerhard Mercator
1542	John Rotz
1550	Pierre Desceliers
1558	Diogo Homem
1560	Baptista Agnese (Portolan Atlas)
1562	Diego Gutierez
1567	Alonso de Santa Cruz
1569	Gerhard Mercator
1580	John Dee
1582	Michael Lok
1584	Ortelius-Chives
Elizabethan-Era Maps
1585	John White (watercolor drawing)
1587	John White (probably drawn by Thomas Harriot and published in 1590 by Theodor de Bry)
1590	Ortelius
1590	John White (published by de Bry, probably compiled from earlier maps)
1591	Theodor de Bry (probably drawn by Jacques le Moyne de Morgues)
1597	Cornely Van Wytfliet (used White as a partial source)
1605	Willem Janszoon Blaeu
1606	Gerhard Mercator–Jodocus Hondius
1608	John Smith
1611	Velasco
1612	Grauen B. Wm. Hole (probably from Smith)
1615	Cornely Van Wytfliet
1624	John Smith
1630	Gerhard Mercator
1640	Blaeu (based on Mercator-Hondius map of 1606)
1646	Robert Dudley
1647	Johannes Jansonius
1651	John (or Nicholas?) Farrer (or Ferrar?)
1651	John Goddard (or Gaddard) (possibly used Farrer’s map as source)
1653	Juan Jansonio (or Jansonius)
1656	Sanson (or Janson)
1657	Nicholas Comberford (Thames School)
1660	Jan Jannsson
1662	John Locke
Proprietary Period Maps
1666	Horne (compilation of explorations published by Hilton)
1667	John Farrer
1670	Augustine Herman (very near North Carolina area)
1671	John Locke (from Spanish sources)
1671	John Ogilby (used Locke’s map and Lederer’s information)
1672	Blome and John Ogilby
1672	John Lederer (shows first town “Sapon” on Roanoke River)
1672	John Ogilby–James Moxon (Lords Proprietors order)
1673	Robert Morden and William Berry
1676	Lamb (probably from John Speed)
1676	John Speed (similar to Ogilby’s map of 1671)
1676	Capt. John Wood (used Morden and Berry as source)
1677	Joel Lancaster (Thames style)
1679	Joel or James Lancaster
1682	Joel Gascoyne (Gascoigne)
1682	Joseph (or James?) Moxon
1684	William (or John) Hack
1684	Maurice Mathews
1685?	John Thornton, Morden and Lea
1686?	John Thornton and Fisher
1687	John Thornton
1695	John Thornton and Morden
1695	Willdey
1696	Guillaume De Lisle
1696	John Sanson (Pierre Mortier was probably publisher using Thorton and Morden under Sanson’s name)
1709	John Lawson
1715	Moll
1718	Guillaume De Lisle
1720	Moll
1720	Van Kenlen
Royal Colony Period, Revolutionary, and Postrevolutionary Maps
1729	Pierre or Peter Vander Aa
1732	Hinder
1733	Edward Moseley
1733	James Wimble
1736?	Moll
1737	Brickell
1738	Edward Moseley
1738	James Wimble
1751	Joshua Fry and Peter Jefferson (two maps)
1755	Dalrymple (revised from Fry and Jefferson)
1768	Thomas Jefferies (or Jefferys)
1770	John Collet
1775	Henry Mouzon
1777	John Gascoigne
1792	Dubibin (from a map dated 1756)
1794	Henry Mouzon and others
1795	Henry Mouzon
Nineteenth-Century Maps
1808	Jonathan Price–John Strother
1820	Hamilton Fulton
1833	John MacRae (or Mac Rae)–Robert H. B. Brazier
1843	John Calvin Smith
1856	Adam and Charles Black
1861	Bachmann
1861	J. H. Colton
1882	Kerr-Cain