Who likes looking at maps?

[Southport Zeb]

It'll be the reference to "Dickursby" that it doesn't like.

[Pérou Flaquettes]

The dialect map is wild, especially as it includes terms I know better as meaning "paw/hoof", "packaging/wrapping", "tarpaulin", "room/play" and "dishcloth"

Ah ah, yes, this particular one is pretty wild but that’s regionalisms for you, they can indeed be full of surprises.

Some explanation here: https://francaisdenosregions.com/201...yer-par-terre/

The bit about Henriette Walter’s work on the subject is interesting, as are the readers’ comments; great 1970’s map of the usage of serpillière in that article (Walter is France’s best-known linguist along with the linguist-lexicographer Alain Rey). The humble floor mop and its many geo-synonyms do have a rich lexical life!

Speaking of the good Henriette ursus, try to read (if you haven’t already) Honni soit qui mal y pense: l'incroyable histoire d'amour entre le français et l'anglais, fascinating book.

[Furtho]

Map showing routes flown by Ala Littoria, the Italian state airline that operated between 1934 and 1945. This is from the late 30s.

[Levin]

Does Ala Littoria sort of translate to Coastal Wings?

[San Bernardhinault]

Very cool. That tells all kinds of interesting stories.

[ursus arctos]

Littoria was Mussolini's model city

People here still call Latina by its original Fascist name: Littoria, referring to the “lictors”, the Roman troops who carried the bundles of rods, or fasces, that gave the party its name.

[Furtho]

Very cool. That tells all kinds of interesting stories.

Yeah. I wish I could find a bigger version, mind.

[ursus arctos]

This one seems to scale up more clearly

[Levin]

Thanks Ursus.

It had never occurred to me that Indonesia was named Batavia until the end of the 40s.

Oh now. Why did they fly to Haifa?

[ursus arctos]

There are a number of head scratchers

Melila and Tetouan are two others, as well as the density of the routes within Albania.

I wonder if it was easier for them to get landing rights at Haifa than at other cities in the general area which they linked with buses. There's also the fact that they flew seaplanes (though I don't know if theirs had that kind of range). Though perhaps the least conspiratorial reason would be that the Vatican and the Italian Church in general have always had significant connections to the Holy Land.

[Furtho]

This one seems to scale up more clearly

Brilliant, much better, thanks. I’ve changed the original post.

[Furtho]

... as well as the density of the routes within Albania.

Yeah, that was among the most interesting things to me, too.

[ursus arctos]

Turns out there has been a significant Italian Hospital in Haifa since 1907

The hospital was established in 1907 and was financed by the National Association to Assist Italian Missionaries (A.N.S.M.I - Associazione Nazionale per Soccorrere i Missionari Italiani), which is an Italian religious organization established for assisting the needy population in the Middle East and providing services to pilgrims, mainly from Italy, during their visits to the Holy Land.

When the hospital was founded, on its previous location in the city (Shivat Zion Street), it was the only surgical hospital in northern Israel. For a period of almost two decades, this hospital functioned as the first and only hospital in the Haifa region

[San Bernardhinault]

Batavia is Jakarta, not Indonesia, I believe.

The Albanian density is surely because Albania was already heavily influenced by Italian reach into their economy. Or this is post 1939, when Albania had already become occupied.

I love the implicit story about the range of Italian planes which results in a number of slightly odd stop-offs which aren't in the fascist countries where almost all the other routes are.

[ursus arctos]

It's summer 1938, and while I take your point about Italian influence in Albania, I don't think that their internal network was ever that dense before or since.

There is a collection of timetables here some of which have links to interior pages. They seem to have been very fond of puddle jumping.

[San Bernardhinault]

Wouldn't the Italians have also been trying to give the impression that Albania was "essentially Italian", so having Italian infrastructure in place would have been politically convenient? Although why Zog would have allowed it, I don't know.

[ursus arctos]

Yes, they would have (which is why there are similar routes to Fiume (Rijeka) and the Dalmatian coast).

Having glanced at the timetables, I have a feeling that the services were rather episodic and not as substantial as the map would lead one to believe.

It is a very interesting artifact of Italian imperial "strategy" on the eve of the war.

[evilC]

A handy tool to help you rationalise how projecting a globe onto a 2D map distorts sizes

[evilC]

"UK: billionaires"

[San Bernardhinault]

A handy tool to help you rationalise how projecting a globe onto a 2D map distorts sizes

Pish! The Mercator is a great map. It's been terribly maligned - mostly because of that terrible West Wing episode. It's just not an equal area map, but everyone knows that. It's great because it's a true representation of shape. All projections compromise in one way or another. Unless you've got a globe, you have to compromise.

[Furtho]

Map of Tacoma, Washington -- straplined "a foot shaped city", 1898.

[tee rex]

Do many cities get known by a shape? Countries are teardrops and body parts and hexagons, but cities? (I'm not going to turn the question into a new nil thread, so let's just hide it here).

[Guy Profumo]

Pish! The Mercator is a great map. It's been terribly maligned - mostly because of that terrible West Wing episode. It's just not an equal area map, but everyone knows that. It's great because it's a true representation of shape. All projections compromise in one way or another. Unless you've got a globe, you have to compromise.

It's also a navigators' map - you can draw a rhumb line on it, and follow the same line on a globe.

[Sits]

Do many cities get known by a shape? Countries are teardrops and body parts and hexagons, but cities? (I'm not going to turn the question into a new nil thread, so let's just hide it here).

"Map of Tasmania" is a rather below-the-belt euphemism in this neck of the woods.

[Furtho]

Maps showing the Jewish population by European country in 1933 and 2015 (sources given at the bottom of each map). Big version here.