Emil von Sydow

Emil von Sydow (15 July 1812 – 13 October 1873) was a German military officer, geographer and cartographer born in Freiberg, Saxony.

Prior to 1843, he was a geography instructor at the military academy in Erfurt, afterwards being appointed as a member of the Ober- Militär-Examinationscommission in Berlin.

From 1855 to 1860, he performed geographical and cartological duties in Gotha, then returned to Berlin, where in 1867 he was appointed Abtheilungschef (division chief) to the Prussian General Staff.

[1] He is considered to be the founder of methodical school cartography, and distinguished himself by creating his own wall maps for classroom instruction.

On these maps, Sydow developed a color methodology for landscape features using hachures, where green was depicted for lowlands and brown used for highlands.