Our map has a long history. With the continuous development of social forms, maps have developed from a single tool carrying political and military functions to a tool for people to learn geography and travel, and users have also developed from officials and military generals to ordinary people.

The original map containing some simple lines and symbols appeared between about10,000 BC and15,000 BC.

At first, people used simple symbols to represent things, and later, words gradually came into being, so symbols and words appeared on the map at the same time.

Chinese characters in China are developed from hieroglyphics. For example, Chinese characters in Sichuan are water, Chinese characters in mountain are composed of three peaks, and Tian Zi is divided into small pieces of land.

These ancient graphic symbols may be the first symbols marked on the map.

The oldest recorded map in China is Jiuding, Yu Xia, 4000 years ago.

Jiuding was a symbol of the ruling power at that time. In addition to projecting various pictures on the tripod, there are original maps representing mountains and rivers.

The oldest preserved maps are the wild hunting map unearthed in garden village, Anyang, Henan Province, and the huge rock painting village map discovered in Canglang County, Yunnan Province, which has a history of 3,500 years.

The earliest existing plane map is Zhao Yutu found in the ruins of Sun Yat-sen's capital city during the Warring States Period in Pingshan County, Hebei Province.

It is a plan of the cemetery design, with regular figures such as "Palace", "Hall" and "Gate", as well as figures of people and distance, and it is carved very finely, which fully shows that the map making level in China was very high at that time.

Some people speculate that the origin of maps predates that of words.

Because the original map, like a painting, faithfully draws mountains, roads and trees, which is a guide for ancient human beings to go out for hunting and labor.

The maps of the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period in China have been widely used in war and state management, and suffered serious losses after Qin and Han Dynasties.

Pei Xiu, a famous map expert, appeared in the Western Jin Dynasty.

Due to political and military needs, Pei Xiu led and organized the compilation of 18 regional maps of Gong Yu, which is the earliest recorded historical atlas in China and even the whole world.

Pei Xiu's main contribution to cartography is that he first established the theory of drawing ancient maps of China.

He summed up the experience of ancient map drawing in China, and put forward the famous epoch-making cartography theory-"Six-body Cartography" in Preface of Gong Yu Area, which became the basis of cartography theory before Ming Dynasty in China, influenced the traditional cartography in China before Qing Dynasty, and occupied an important position in the history of cartography in China and the world.

/kloc-Before the middle of the 0/9th century, people thought that maps were "the abbreviation of the earth's surface on the plane" or "the epitome of the earth on the plane".

This definition is simple and easy to be understood by most people, but it is not accurate and comprehensive.

Because this definition also applies to other images, such as landscape paintings, landscape photos, aerial photos or satellite photos.

It doesn't fully express the characteristics that distinguish maps from other images.

With the expansion of map application and the development of map science, people have a deeper understanding of map and a more accurate definition of map, that is, map is based on certain mathematical laws, and uses map language to represent the graphics on the earth's surface through drawing and synthesis.

This definition summarizes three characteristics of a map: it has certain mathematical rules, it is described in map language, and it is synthesized by drawing.

These three basic features of the map are impossible for other images, pictures and words to have at the same time.

In modern society, the types of maps are more abundant, and the use of maps is becoming more and more common.

We often come into contact with all kinds of maps in our daily life, study and work.

In addition to common paper maps and thematic maps (such as plastic three-dimensional maps and globes), there are also electronic maps, multimedia maps and network maps.

Traditional paper maps, thematic maps, electronic maps, multimedia maps and network maps are all different forms of maps, and their three basic features will not change.

Each map contains a lot of geographical information. Using the combination of points, lines and surfaces, tangible things such as topography, rivers, lakes, traffic lines and towns can be vividly represented, as well as intangible phenomena such as realms, longitude and latitude lines and isotherms.

The interpretation of these symbols composed of points, lines and faces is the legend.

Symbol system and annotations constitute the unique language of maps.

Using map language to represent geographical things is more intuitive than other languages, characters and codes.