Cartographica Helvetica

Summary

Hans-Uli Feldmann:

A route map by Albert Anker

Cartographica Helvetica 25 (2002) 25–33

Summary:

In Switzerland Albert Anker (1831–1910) was already a famous and officially honored painter during his lifetime. Outside of Switzerland his paintings – mostly rural scenes and still lifes of the peasant countryside – were known mainly in France and England. However, a few of his paintings are also interesting from the cartographic point of view, such as The Surveyor with his plane-table, or The Peasants and the Newspaper showing meticulously detailed maps.

In 1884 Albert Anker drew a route map for his 10-year-old son so that he would be able to walk the 45 kilometers from his home in Ins to Oberburg, where he lived in a boarding school. The 'Dufour Map' 1:100,000 served as the cartographic base for this 'itinerary route' which is 108 x 19 cm. Besides this route map, Anker drew various other maps, mostly sketches, of tourist areas in Switzerland or of archeological sites in Greece and Turkey.

Bibliographic note

Based on a paper read at 10th Kartographiehistorisches Colloquium, Bonn, 14 to 16 September 2000.