Becket, November 9, 2012
Flaq,
Looking through maps to write about, I found
this amazing one of Paris!
The "Plan de
Turgot", first published in 1739.
Yes, roughly contemporary to the famous "Nolli" map of Rome
and at least as involved. The Turgot
map--named after Michel-Étienne Turgot, the "prévôt des marchads de Paris" (the
major) that comissioned it--is
really an atlas of 20 plates covering the historical core of the city (roughly
the area of the first eight present-day arrondisements) and the
"fabourgs" that would later develop as the next ring of
arrondisements (nine to eleven.)
Each sheet is a rectangle 50 by 80 cm, so if you were to assemble them
together, the whole thing would be something like 8 x 10.5 feet! It's really not a true plan but more of
a bird's eye view. Technically
speaking it's an oblique projection (a parallel projection, not a perspective
with vanishing points) so everything is drawn to scale. It must have required an enormous
amount of information, since it depicts each and every building down to the
facades, windows and roofs. I suspect
that it would have been a rather old-fashion way of drawing a city map even the
time (this kind of projection was called "cavalier projection" and
was originally developed for military purposes.)
Yes, plenty to look at and write about in
this map. Certainly more than enough
for the next week or so while you're in Paris.
Papá
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