Inscribed on the John Carter Brown Library are the words "Speak to the past and it will answer," the message that inspired the exhibition "Map Talk: A Conversation with Maps." The exhibit, a collection of maps ranging from the year 1492 to the end of the American colonial period, is on display at the library through the end of May.
Walking into the library is like going back in time. Rare book collections, which have survived hundreds of years, surround you. The glass cases in the reading room hold unique historical treasures — maps.
"Maps are an integral part of the expansion process" of the Western world, said Susan Danforth, curator of maps and prints for the library. In analyzing them, we speak to the people of the past, she said. Details that were included or left out can reveal much about the cultural climate of the period in which they were made.
"Maps have a point of view," Danforth said. "They were produced for a reason." She said that the questions these maps inspire about the past are relevant to the way we should be thinking about the world today.
All of the maps are "examples of people trying to make sense of their world that was rapidly changing," Danforth said, adding that the effort to understand a changing world remains applicable today.
The "Map Talk" exhibit is entirely composed of items from the John Carter Brown Library collections. Most maps on display were originally included in books and atlases, so they are an "intrinsic part of the John Carter Brown book collection," Danforth said.
When asked where the exhibit idea came from and how it was put together, Danforth gave a slight smile and pointed to her head. She explained that she became interested in the story of Western expansion through the materials she curates, and then found the maps that best illustrated that story.
Danforth highlighted one unique map in particular. The map "Mountserrat Island 1673" was not crafted by a cartographer, but rather by a mariner who drew the island from the viewpoint of the sea. It is an extremely detailed piece, crafted on vellum.
Across from this map of Mountserrat in the exhibit is a later version with the disclaimer, "This plan of the island of Mountserrat … is not to be relied upon." Though it was made after the mariner's map, it is not nearly as accurate.
Another important map in the exhibit is an edition of Ptolemy's geography books, the first to contain pictoral maps and the first time copper plates were used in mapmaking. Most impressively, though, the color on the map has remained intact since 1477.
The exhibit also contains the 1642 deed to Warwick, R.I., and other interesting pieces such as "German towns of the Holy Roman Empire (1493)," "Terrestrial globe (1835)" and "New England, showing Massachusetts boundaries (1678)."
