Explore notable historical maps of Roman Britain, stretching back to 1265. Maps are listed in ascending chronological order and each listing includes links to third-party websites which either provide images of the full map or related information.
Tabula Peutingeriana (1265)
Tabula Peutingeriana (trans. "The Peutinger Map"), also referred to as Peutinger's Tabula or the Peutinger Table, is an illustrated itinerarium (ancient Roman road map) showing the layout of the cursus publicus, the road network of the Roman Empire. The map is a thirteenth-century parchment copy of a possible Roman original.
Links
- Full map (via Wikimedia)
- Segmentum I, including the conjectural recreation of Britannia (via Bibliotheca Augustana)
Prima Europe Tabula (originally second century; extant editions from 1478)
Created in the second century by Claudius Ptolemy (c. 100–c. 170), Prima Europe Tabula presented a contemporary record of Roman Britain. Although no original copy exists, the earliest surviving reproduction appears in the 1478 edition of Ptolemy's Geographia (trans. "Geography").
Links
- Full map (via Wikimedia)
- Overview (via Stanford University)
- Overview of Ptolemy's Geography (via The Roads of Roman Britain)
- Overview of Ptolemy's Geography (via Roman Britain)
Britannicarum Insularum Typus (1570)
Created by Abraham Ortelius (1527–98), Britannicarum Insularum Typus (trans. "Map of the British Isles") appeared in Ortelius's Theatrum Orbis Terrarum (trans. "Theatre of the Orb of the World"), a seminal atlas first published in 1570.
Links
- Full map (via the Folger Shakespeare Library)
- Overview of Theatrum Orbis Terrarum (via Google Arts & Culture)
Britannia title page (1586)
The title page of William Camden's (1551–1623) Britannia, first published in 1586.
Links
- Full map, hand-coloured (via Wikimedia)
- Full map (via the British Museum)
- William Camden's Britannia (via the Royal Collection Trust)
Britannia Romana (c. 1695)
Created by Robert Morden (1650–1703), Britannia Romana appeared in later editions of William Camden's aforementioned Britannia.
Links
Mappa Britanniae faciei Romanae, secundum fidem Monumentorum perveterum depicta (c. 1757)
Purportedly created in the fourteenth century by a monk named Richard of Cirencester, Mappa Britanniae faciei Romanae was 'discovered' and published in the mid-eighteenth century by William Stukeley. However, both the map and an accompanying manuscript were later proven to be fake.
Links
- Full map (via the British Library)
- Overview (via the British Library)
- William Stukeley, An Account of Richard of Cirencester, Monk of Westminster, and of his Works: with his Antient Map of Roman Brittain; and the Itinerary Thereof (via Google Books)