What are the documents about maps in China?

The ancient maps of China are mostly partial, and there are few maps about the whole country or a large area. More military maps are made temporarily, and sand tables are also made by ancient scouts according to the temporarily detected terrain.

According to legend, there was a war between the Yellow Emperor and Chiyou. The Yellow Emperor ordered one of his ministers, Shi Huang, to draw a physical map of the terrain. This map played a great role in the war between the Yellow Emperor and Chiyou. The Yellow Emperor used this map to capture Chiyou in the wild of Jizhou.

In primitive times, it was extremely difficult for the ancestors to survive. Whether they want to expand their territory and compete for more resources, or to avoid the invasion of natural disasters such as floods, storms, rain and snow, the most urgent need is to decide whether tribes should go out or migrate or to mark practical graphics of rivers and landforms according to astronomy, orientation and topography.

The primitive geographical figures drawn by Shi Huang not only realized the functions of divining heaven and earth and offering sacrifices to ghosts and gods, but also easily became the reference for the Yellow Emperor to use in combat and the basis for adopting different tactics, and became the magic weapon for the Yellow Emperor to win.

Huangdi used the geographical features shown in the map of Huangdi Neijing to arrange the army. He sent General Ying Long to build a dam on a high place to store water to stop Chiyou, and used domesticated wild animals to directly rush into Chiyou camp to fight through favorable terrain.

The Yellow Emperor also used astronomical changes to win fighter planes. According to Chiyou's intention to win with the help of foggy chaos, he skillfully used the changes of gale and dusty weather after fog and relied on the guidance of South Locomotive to pursue victory and capture Chiyou alive.

The splendor of these processes is precisely the outstanding role of maps in the primitive period of China, and the result of geographical features and meteorological changes.

During the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, maps have been widely used in military affairs. "pipe? Map records that where the main soldiers fight, they must first look at the picture and understand the terrain so as not to lose. "Sun Tzu's art of war? Topography also records that if there is no map and you don't understand the terrain, you will fail.

Military maps of this period are all carved on wooden boards, including mountains, rivers, towns, roads and other related positions, all of which have a certain proportion, and compasses are also widely used.

By the Qin dynasty, the application of military sand table in operational research had appeared. Historical records? The chronicle of Qin Shihuang records: "Take mercury as a hundred rivers, hungry for each other, with astronomy above and geography below."

It is said that when Qin deployed to destroy the Six Kingdoms, Qin Shihuang personally made a sand table to study the geographical situation of various countries, and with the assistance of Reese, he sent general Wang Jian to carry out a unified war. Later, when Qin Shihuang built the mausoleum, he piled up a large-scale terrain model in the tomb and used it as a sacrifice, indicating that Qin Shihuang realized the importance of maps from the United War.

The model in Qin Shihuang's tomb not only includes mountains, hills and cities, but also uses mercury to simulate rivers and seas, and uses mechanical devices to make mercury flow and circulate. It can be said that this is the earliest prototype of sand table, which has a history of more than 2200 years.

Archaeologists unearthed three maps painted on silk in Mawangdui No.3 tomb in Changsha, Hunan Province, including garrison map, topographic map and city map. The garrison map reflects the deployment of troops in defensive operations at that time.

The garrison map has the characteristics of special military use, highlighting the name of the garrison, the distribution position of the garrison, castles, fortresses, beacon towers, pools, and the boundaries of defense areas. It is the earliest painted military map that can be seen in the world now, which embodies the exquisite knowledge level of geographical maps at that time.

The garrison map shows the contents of the main checkpoints related to garrison activities in bright colors. The conspicuous triangular castle represents the base camp, and the red and black border represents the fortress.

The basic geographical elements such as mountains, rivers and so on are marked with light cyan and placed on the secondary level of the drawing base map. The level is clear and clear, similar to the multi-level plane representation of modern thematic maps.

The mountain in the garrison map is a pictograph in the shape of "mountain", and the ridge is represented by a single line. This river is light blue. In this way, the load of non-professional content on drawings is reduced, and the practical effect of highlighting professional content and theme is achieved.

The residential areas in the garrison map are represented by red circles, which indicate the number of households, and also indicate the largest and smallest number of households in the residential areas. Most roads are connected with major residential areas and marked in striking red.

The garrison map reflects the terrain of the garrison camp. Choose favorable terrain conditions for the garrison camp. Many castles are surrounded by water and backed by mountains, and watchtowers are set up to control the terrain. It embodies the traditional deployment of compound forces in ancient China, and attaches importance to the defense thought of using terrain.

The garrison map clearly indicates the trapezoidal military deployment composed of first-line troops, second-line troops, headquarters and reserve forces at that time. The beacon tower was also marked on the ridge of the protected area, which was both a frontier observation post and a communication facility.

According to the Book of the Later Han Dynasty? The Biography of Ma Yuan records that in 32 AD, when Emperor Guangwu conquered Xiao Wei, a local strongman in Tianshui and Wudu, General Ma Yuan "gathered rice as a ravine to point out the situation", which made Emperor Guangwu feel "trapped in my eyes". This is the precedent of using sand table to study tactics in the history of China War.

Sui and Tang Dynasties were the prosperous times of feudal society in China, with unprecedented political and economic prosperity, rapid development of science and culture, and mature development of ancient science and technology system. In this context, military surveying and mapping technologies, such as military map making, military engineering survey and military geographic survey, have also made a series of significant achievements.

During the Sui and Tang Dynasties, the Ministry of War set up a department responsible for military surveying and mapping, including the mapping and management of maps of the whole country and surrounding areas. Sui Shu? According to the Records of Baiguan, there is a map department under the Ministry of War.

In the Tang Dynasty, the Ministry of Vocational Affairs mastered the dynamic changes of military geography in five major regions: military towns, garrison locations or regions, beacon towers and city defenses. These military geographical elements have been vividly displayed on military maps.

During the Sui and Tang Dynasties, military map making showed unprecedented prosperity. According to New Tang Book? According to Yiwenzhi, there were 160 kinds of geographical maps at that time, with 1292 volumes, of which 18 kinds of maps, with 489 volumes. Among these maps, the famous military maps or maps with military use mainly include:

Mao Yu's Chronicle of Yu Tu in Sui Dynasty (volume 128): The Atlas of Various Countries compiled by Langmao is 100; Pei Ju, who is in charge of northwest military affairs, compiled a three-volume map of the Western Regions.

In the Tang Dynasty, there were Jia Dan's maps of Longyou in Guanzhong and Kyushu in Shannan, a map of Chinese and foreign families, and a map of ten roads in Zhenyuan. Li Jifu presided over the compilation and drawing of Ten Roads Map (volume 10) and Yuanhe County Records (volume 40), of which only Yuanhe County Records were handed down from generation to generation.

In addition, during the Sui and Tang Dynasties, a large number of regional maps appeared, such as Hebei Dangerous Map and Huaixi Map, which became an important part of military maps.

During the Northern Song Dynasty, Shen Kuo, a famous scientist, developed the method of making sand table, and made the boundary terrain between Dasong and Qidan into a wooden terrain model. For convenience, it was later made of stone paste sawdust on the board. Dingzhou, where he lives, is cold in winter and easy to fall off. It is made of melted wax.

Presented to the emperor, Song Shenzong appreciated it very much and wrote a letter to the frontier states to follow suit. Because it is suitable for the army, it quickly became popular.

Zhu Siben, a cartographer in Yuan Dynasty, drew the map in 65,438+00 years based on the field investigation data and previous work. Zhu Siben used a wide range of materials, carefully selected and planned painting method, and its accuracy exceeded that of the previous generation. This is a very influential map in the map history of China. Unfortunately, the map is too big to carry and carve, and it has been lost.

Zhu Siben was a geographer and cartographer in Yuan Dynasty. He traveled to Hebei, Shanxi, Shandong, Henan, Jiangsu, Anhui, Zhejiang, Jiangxi, Hubei and Hunan provinces. He inherited the painting method of Pei Xiu in Wei and Jin Dynasties and Jia Dan in Tang Dynasty, that is, he put squares when painting, each square represents a certain mileage, and drew a map of Yu, making him an epoch-making figure in the history of geography and China map in Yuan Dynasty.

The map of the map is based on China and set off by foreign countries, with detailed content and accurate graphic outline. This map systematically used legend symbols and became a model for drawing national general maps in the early years of Yuan, Ming and Qing Dynasties.

Mindeiro Hongxian changed Zhu Siben's Map to Wide Map. This atlas is a world atlas with the territory of the Ming Dynasty as the core and dividing the administrative regions at that time. In addition, the atlas is accompanied by some special maps that are vital to the national economy. Thus, it constitutes a national comprehensive atlas with complete style in Ming Dynasty. This atlas was reprinted many times in the Ming and Qing Dynasties, which spread widely and had great influence.

Guang Yu Tu is composed of 45 maps, including nine-sided map, coastal defense map and river defense map, which has obvious military nature.

In order to resist the harassment of the northern Wala ethnic group, the Ming court drew a nine-border map from the Yalu River in the east to Jiayuguan in the west, and drew maps for nine border defense towns such as Liaodong, Fu Xuan, Datong, Yansui, Ningxia, Gansu, Jizhou, Taiyuan and Guyuan. Every town is heavily guarded, which is the relevant northern defense system.

Next to each border map, there is a sketch, which introduces the number of troops stationed, the number of soldiers and horses in subordinate border towns and the situation of hoarding food and grass.

Chen Zuxiang, who was in charge of the map of the Ministry of War in the Ming Dynasty, made a detailed study of the old maps left over from history and drew a map of the empire and the Ming Dynasty, which reflected the importance attached to military elements.

For the needs of Chen Zusui's work in the Ministry of War, this drawing focuses on the drawing of military elements. For example, in drawing the geographical elements of the frontier, we have changed the shortcoming of drawing the territory in detail from the old map. He also painted the lost land of the old Tuming dynasty in his paintings, saying that he should never "abandon himself without asking" to inspire the belief of recovering the country.

The coastal defense map is also a military map of the Ming Dynasty. On the chart, there are not only road maps of Japanese invasion of the coast, but also maps of coastal sand hills, depicting coastal towns, islands, mountains, oceans, beaches, coastlines and camps.

The focus is on coastal mountainous terrain, estuaries and bays, small islands and reefs, military camps, command posts and beacon towers. The orientation of the map is mostly based on the mainland and the ocean as the upper end.

The defense map of the Yangtze River is also a military map that appeared in the Ming Dynasty. It is like a pair of twin sisters with the coastal defense map. The relatively complete map of Ming Dynasty is the coastal defense map in Ryan's essays. The map shows the topography, residential areas, towns and city walls, towers, islands in the river on both sides of the Yangtze River, as well as the description of the river defense forces.

In the late Ming and early Qing Dynasties, western mapping technology had a great influence on cartography in China, which made cartography in China enter a new era of modern cartography. Emperor Kangxi was very interested in surveying geography and drawing maps. During his three expeditions to Galdin and his voyage to the northeast, he asked people to measure longitude and latitude anytime and anywhere to prepare for drawing maps.

When the Qing court drew maps, it paid attention to the investigation of the historical evolution of border areas and the measurement of latitude and longitude.

For example, the imperial map during the Yongzheng period not only reflected the topography, politics and military situation of northeast China, Mongolia, Xinjiang, Tibet and mainland 15 provinces at that time, but also included Siberia, mountains, rivers and residents in Central Asia west of Pamir and east of Mediterranean Sea. It was really a big map of China and foreign countries.

When the Qing Dynasty drew the map, it clearly marked the scope of its sovereignty over the territory and the effective jurisdiction of the border areas. Pay special attention to the territory of Tibet, Xinjiang and southeast seas. Similar maps in Qing dynasty all have obvious military nature.

The national map drawn in the Qing Dynasty is not only a symbol and strong evidence of the national territory in the18th century, but also has high scientific and technological academic value.