Introduction

Maps might be the most widely used data visualization in modern society. With the rise of the smartphone and online interactive map services such as google maps, it can be easily accessed by anyone. But how was it looked like two thousand years ago, long before those technologies were born? The three earlier world maps, which were drawn by Muhanmad al-ldrisi, Claudius Ptolemy and Martin Waldseemüller respectively, presented on the second lecture were truly fascinating, dramatically different from the world map we are familiar with today. It made me started to wonder how ancient people in my country interpret their surrounding world. Therefore my topic for this timeline lab is: “A Brief History of Chinese Cartography”.

Methodology

To gain a basic understanding of the history of Chinese cartography, I started with Google search and found the books Ancient Chinese Mapping, wrote by Jianxiong Ge and History of Cartography, Edited by J. B. Harley and David Woodward. Both books provided literal and visual information about the milestones and breakthroughs of mapping in ancient China. Eventually, 8 maps from 5 dynasties were selected to illustrate how mapping techniques were evolved during the 2000-year time frame. Wikimedia Commons was used additionally for collecting visual data.

The open-source tool Knightlab TimelineJS was assigned for the realization of the project. I was able to create my own data set by simply replacing the data in the provided Google Spreadsheet template with what I had collected in the research phase, including dates, headlines, texts, and media, etc. Then, after making sure the spreadsheet was published to the Web, I copied and pasted the URL from my browser’s address bar into the timeline generator to view the results. What is more, the live preview function allowed me to modify the dataset and see the changes in real-time to quickly understand how the tools worked together and to achieve a better visual result. 

Results

Reflection

I think it is a very educational experiment, for both understanding the general and data visualization history of my own country. Just as writing, mapping techniques are invented independently in different parts of the world, showcasing human’s need to record and visualize the data around them. unfortunately, as China does not has an authoritative open-data platform or e-repository of ancient maps, I had to collect free-to-use data from Wikimedia Commons, which is banned in China. As a result, the search results are very limited and some of the maps I am using may not be able to present my point visually. I would definitely try to contact the national or local museums if given more time.

The TimelineJS is an extremely easy-to-use visualization tool, even for the beginners. The instruction is clear and the preview function is a huge plus. It also offers some optional settings, allowing the users to customize their design, though it is somewhat limited. I personally had some confusion during the realization, as I was using one or two maps, which in most cases takes only a few years to draw, to represent the breakthroughs in a dynasty, which might last up to 300 years. I think the illustration would be more readable if I can add a colored layer of the started and ended year of each dynasty in the timeline background. In addition to that, as the image takes up ¾ of the page and is placed on top of the timeline, a milestone with literal information only may not be suitable in this visualization, and I had to remove several key evolvements because of that. As Knightlab states one can use JSON to create custom installations, I would love to learn JSON to overcome those flaws and develop the timeline further.