Mapping the Russian Far East: Cartography and the Representation of Sakhalin, the kurils, and Japan in the 18th century

• Main Author: YAMADA-KOMEIE Shinobu
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: 法政大学文学部 2007
• Subjects: Bering Strait; Kamchatka; Sakhalin; Siberia
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/10114/3120; https://hosei.repo.nii.ac.jp/?action=repository_uri&item_id=4053; https://hosei.repo.nii.ac.jp/?action=repository_action_common_download&item_id=4053&item_no=1&attribute_id=22&file_no=1

This paper examines the changing of the representation of the Russian Far East, especially Sakhalin, the Kurils, and Japan, in the context of Russian mapmaking in the eighteenth century. The history of Russian cartography ha the compilation of Remezov’s Atlas of Siberia (Chertyozhnaya Kniga Sibiri) from the second half of the seventeenth century to the beginning of eighteenth century and the publication of Kirilov’s Atlas, the 1745 atlas of Russian Academy in the first half of the eighteenth century. During this period there were many organized Russian scientific expeditions and Russia expanded her territory as an imperial state. The author clarifies the way geographical information about Sakhalin, the Kurils, and Japan were portrayed in maps of the Russian Far East in these atlases and some manuscript maps which were influenced by Bering’s expedition -known as the Great Northern Expedition- in the first half of the eighteenth century. This geographical expedition to Siberia, Kamchatka, and the Bering Strait led to rapid progress in geographical knowledge and a changing of the geographical shape of the Kurils in Russian mapmaking, however, that of Sakhalin and Japan remained as before.