A Literary and Historical Atlas of Asia

INTRODUCTION

Fourth in the series of special atlases designed for "Everyman's Library" the present volume deals with the countries of Asia, whose history and geography, and whose possibilities, great and grave, are alike reflected in the maps and charts that follow. When Queen Elizabeth granted to certain merchants of London a charter that gave them a roving commission to trade in the East Indies, she could not foresee the immense developments that were to rise from that adventurous commerce between east and west. The successive maps of India with their frontier changes mark the gradual advance of an old world toward the new one knit by powerful mutual ties to the Isle of Britain; and recently we have seen what it is to be hoped will open a greater era for those regions, marked by a return to the old capital of Delhi, and a resuming of ancient rites which first gained their symbolism in those lands.

But Asia, as Japan has taught us and as China will undoubtedly teach us again, has her own destiny to bear out, apart from our European interests and politics; and it is in that aspect we need to study her on the lines laid down and made clear and positive in this volume. It is not the military records, the charts of mutinies and battle-fields, interesting as they are, which are alone important; but those showing the conditions, physical and climatic, of the country; the dispersion of the tongues, the sites of the old religions, the wealth and tillage of the earth with its fruits, grain and minerals, its rice fields and tea plantations; the prevalence of rain, sun and trade-winds; and the course of the sea-roads that affect its human and industrial life.

A gazetteer does not always seem to the ordinary man a very entertaining thing, but in this of Asia its compiler, Miss Grant, has tried to mark in brief, close compacted in small type, the place-associations, historical and other, that give life to the names of town or country. She has related them to the books that have dealt with them, and the events they have witnessed: given Ning-po its allusion to Marco Polo's travels, and Madras its San Thomé pedigree, connected Palmyra with Tamerlane, and Puri, Bengal, with the gold tooth of the Buddha and the Temple of Vishnu's incarnation. In the Brief Survey of the Coins and Coinage, Mr. J. Allan (of the Coins and Medal Department, British Museum) has traced the record from Lydia, six centuries and more B.C., to our own time. His notes on the Phoenician coins—"tetradrachms of Tyre with a dolphin or the god Melkart riding on a sea-horse," or an owl with a crook and a flail (Egyptian royal symbols); or the double shekels of Sidon with a galley, sails, or oars, before a walled city on one side, and a king of Persia on the other—show how much of history a set of coins, apparently so secretive, may hide in their silver and gold impressions.

In this Asian Atlas, of small dimensions as it requires to be to fit its pocket, Irkutsk in the north, "far Mandalay," the details of the East and West Indies, the route of Marco Polo, coasts like the Carnatic, towns like Lucknow and Cawnpore, Lhasa, "the Forbidden City" of Tibet, and Matsuye, the old capital of Idzumo, which Lafcadio Hearn describes, all have their record. It remains to be said, that as in other volumes of the same set, Dr. Bartholomew of Edinburgh has acted as cartographer; and the editor and publishers wish to acknowledge his large practical aid in the design of the atlas. Also, they owe a word of thanks to Mr. William Foster of the India Office for his expert advice.

Finally, they wish to dedicate the volume to the people and the princes of India, Japan, and the other countries of which it is a memorial, believing in their great future.

E. R.

CONTENTS

COLOURED MAPS

  PAGE

The World according to Hecatæus, B.C. 500

1

The World according to Eratosthenes, B.C. 220

2

Quadrans Habitabilis according to Abu Rihan Birunensis, A.D. 1030

3

class="hanging">Egyptian Empire, B.C. 1450 4

Babylonian Empire, B.C. 560

5

Persian Empire at its greatest Extent, 525 B.C.

6, 7

Empire of Alexander the Great, 325 B.C.

8, 9

Asia Minor

10, 11

Palestine, Old Testament

12

Palestine, New Testament

13

Asia, Early Explorers

14, 15

Asia, Thirteenth Century

16

Asia, about 1740

17

India, 1705

18

India, 1765

19

India, 1805

20

India, 1857

21

The Far East, 1800

22, 23

Russian Advances in Central Asia

24, 25

The World on Mercator's Projection. Showing Routes to Asia

26, 27

Asia—Orographical

28  

River Basins

29  

January Temperature

30  

July Temperature

31  

January Rainfall

32  

July Rainfall

33  

Mean Annual Rainfall

34  

Vegetation

35  

Races

36  

class="smcap">Religions 37  

Population

38  

Political

39

Economic Map of Asia on Mercator's Projection

40, 41

Trade Routes of Asia on Mercator's Projection

42, 43

Turkey in Asia, Arabia, Persia, Afghanistan, and Baluchistan

44, 45

Asia Minor, Syria, etc.

46, 47

Suez Canal

48

Aden

49

Orographical Central Asia, with Indian Frontiers

50, 51

Indian Empire

52, 53

Products of India

54, 55

Bombay, Berar, and part of Central India

56, 57

Punjab, Sind, Rajputana, Kashmir, etc.

58, 59

United and Central Provinces, Bengal, Assam, etc.

60, 61

Madras, Haidarabad, Mysore, and Ceylon

62, 63

Environs of Bombay

64

Environs of Calcutta

65

Orographical Farther India

66

Burma

67

Malay States

68, 69

Siam and Indo-China

70, 71

The Far East, Economic

72, 73

East Indies

74, 75

Java

76

Philippine Islands

77

Island of Singapore

78

Hong-Kong

79

China and Japan

80, 81

Northern China

82, 83

Southern China

84, 85

Environs of Peking and Shanghai

86

Environs of Hong-Kong and Manila

87

Japan

88, 89

Korea and Manchuria

90

Central Japan

91

Environs of Tokio

92

Environs of Port-Arthur and Nagasaki

93

Siberia

94, 95

Environs of Vladivostok

96  

A BRIEF SURVEY OF THE COINAGES OF ASIA, From the Earliest Times to the Present Day, by J. Allan, M.A., M.R.A.S.

97

LINE MAPS

  PAGE Battle of Sirangapatam, February 1792 130 Battle of Assaye, September 1803 131 Battle of Meanee, February 1843 131 Battle of Aliwal, January 1846 132 Battle of Sobraon, February 1846 132 Indian Mutiny, showing Distribution of Troops, May 1857 133

Aryan Languages of India 134 Non-Aryan Languages of India 135 Sites of Ancient Indian Temples 136, 137 Military Divisions of India 138 Delhi 139 Lucknow 140 Cawnpore 141 Lahore 142 Rangoon 143 Lhasa, "The Forbidden City" 144     A Gazetteer of Towns and Places in Asia having an Historic Interest 145     Index 173

class="caption">ASIA
EARLY EXPLORERS

John Bartholomew & Co., Edinr

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