Gough Map

More recently, the map was believed to have been made within an eleven-year window, based on historical changes of place names and sizes.

It is thought that much of the information about the map was gained from either one or more men who travelled around Great Britain as part of Edward I's military expeditions into Wales and Scotland.

For example, the cartographic accuracy in Oxfordshire could be explained by the fact that William Rede, Fellow of Merton College, had successfully calculated the geographic coordinates for Oxford in 1340.

And compared to previously known maps, like Ptolemy's Geography, it greatly improves the detail on the coast of England and Wales, although its depiction of the then independent Kingdom of Scotland is very poor.

Notably, islands and lakes such as Anglesey and Windermere are oversized, whilst the strategic importance of rivers is shown by their emphasis.

[11] The map contains numerous references to mythology as if they were geographical fact, as illustrated by comments about Brutus' mythical landings in Devon.

[6] A notable feature of the Gough Map is the disjointed network, across much of England and Wales, of narrow red lines drawn between settlements.

[14] In a change of emphasis, however, recent scholarship sees the lines as routes, or as graphic representations of distance rather than of physical roads.

Their task was to re-evaluate the existing, often contradictory, literatures with the aid of newly-available high resolution scans and spectral imaging techniques.

Grey stains over many of the place names have been found to be caused by a reagent (made from oak galls and Madeira wine) applied at Richard Gough's request, that he had hoped would make faded writing more legible.

On-going research extends the number of regional case studies already carried out (Northwest England, North Norfolk coast).