Framed Asian Maps
When we think of Asia, we think of Hello Kitty. Pokémon. Beijing Opera. Kim Jong Un. Asia is well known in the West today, but it wasn't always like that. Before modern times, there was the famous Silk Road, which traded spices, cloth, food, and ideas. To help find their way, the traders and explorers of Asia made many maps, which are now framed maps of Asia.
Asia is a huge area, as evidenced by the framed map of Asia “Small Nautical Map of Asia.” It includes everywhere east of Europe, having Arabia, Russia, China, East Asia, Southeast Asia, and India. Historically China and Russia used to be huge empires that spanned across their respective continents, and contain many cultures and peoples. Europeans considered them to be very interesting people, and were even more interested in doing commerce with the Chinese. Isn't business just lovely?
The framed Asian map “1710 First Japanese Buddhist Map of the World Showing Europe, America, and Africa” is a political map by Japanese, in Japanese language, showing these other nations. In that time period Japanese had made contact with the Europeans, and were learning about the West, just like we were learning about the East.
Japan is illustrated in words in a geopolitical art map “Japan” by American Flat. Literally all the cities are in words, in the shape of Japan, as well as their population size, which is in the size of the text. It is quite nice for those who have been there.