Eratosthenes/Strabo Greek Map

My first attempt at a map, taken from www.henry-davis.com/MAPS/carto.html

Eratosthenes was a cyrenacian who was the second chief librarian at the Library of Alexandria, apointed around 236BC. He was the first to calculate the size of the Earth (fairly) accurately and also created a map of the known world. He was a contempory and friend of Archimedes. After Eratosthenes went blind he committed suicide by starvation. Many years later Strabo used Eratosthenes' map while compiling his Geographica in the first century AD.

The file is an ancient Greek map of the world, and therefore looks considerably different from how you would expect. I've had to change some of the terrain quite a lot, for example the euphrates and Tigris run west to east in reality, rather than north to south as in this map. I hope that people will be able to find a use for this, and would appreciate any feedback about how to improve it.

UPDATED - beta version now uploaded. Also, I should have mentioned that the previous version very an alpha version, sorry . The beta map is provided clean, with no resources.

Main changes for beta version: Terrain is more varied in Africa, most of the rivers have been rerouted and the Aral sea added, lots of changes to the Iran/Afghanistan area. Other minor changes to make the map slightly closer to reality.

UPDATED - V1 00 has resources and start locations. I have tried to add the resources in such a way as to allow for good gameplay, rather than to be historically accurate. The start locations are by no means fair and equitable. India is in an awesome position to expand, but you should only play as the US if you have a death wish. Luxury resources are often bunched in one location (e.g. Silks in the far east), and some Strategic resources may be hard for certain nations to capture. Feedback is still very welcome of course.

Changes from Beta version - very few. Added land bridge at Gibraltar. Added a few fresh water lakes to allow for irrigation.

UPDATED - Changed file to allow up to 31 civs instead of 7 (oops). Thanks to Blue Monkey for the heads up.

Preview of minimap for beta version:

Greatly Incorrect Map ! You and Tr0x should get together and make some other incorrect maps.

The map is indeed greatly incorrect , but by design. Tr0x's Ptolomy map is superb, but I was looking for an Ancient Greek map that I could use in an Alexander scenario, and Ptolomy's map isn't useful (too late) in that respect.

As for making more, that depends if I can get a better source, it's not much fun trying to create a whole map from a fuzzy picture of a coastline.

With what time I have to spare, I've only gotten a chance to look at the screenshot you posted

From what I can tell, it looks great! Certainly some really cool ideas put into it and I've seen maps that look like this one so you've done your homework

But, it's not perfect (and neither is my map! )

Africa for example, looks far too barren. Even back in 200 BC, the Greeks had contact with the Egyptians who would have told them of the jungles in Nubia/Central Africa.

I'll comment more later but I've gotta go to work!

Cheers

Tr0x - Thanks for dropping in to comment.

You're right about the terrain in Africa, I'll have to do some work on that. The picture I worked from was poor quality, and I more or less had to twist the terrain from a regular map to fit into the coastline. I think the main thing you need for a believable map is a good relation between mountains and rivers. That's something I think you did well in your Ptolomy map, but mine needs some work.

I'll make some changes to the map, and post it in the next few days.

I really like the changes and updates! The desert in Africa is still a bit big for my liking but I like maps with a very fertile Africa (see my map )

Anyway, keep up the great work. I'd really like to collaberate on a map sometime if you have a chance. Just let me know!

Thanks for the comments Tr0x. I think that I left Africa a bit barren because this map is meant to be for an Alexander the Great mod that I'm working on. I wanted room for the Numidians, Carthaginians, Egyptians, Nubians and Axumites, but didn't want any of these civs to have room to expand very far - therefore loads of desert. I think I can still make some improvements in the European and Indian areas, especially with the river courses.

I'd be up for a collaborative map, I'll post over on your Ptolomy thread about that. I won't have too much time available for the next few weeks due to work on Alexander, but after that maybe...

Keroro said:

Thanks for the comments Tr0x. I think that I left Africa a bit barren because this map is meant to be for an Alexander the Great mod that I'm working on. I wanted room for the Numidians, Carthaginians, Egyptians, Nubians and Axumites, but didn't want any of these civs to have room to expand very far - therefore loads of desert. I think I can still make some improvements in the European and Indian areas, especially with the river courses.

I'd be up for a collaborative map, I'll post over on your Ptolomy thread about that. I won't have too much time available for the next few weeks due to work on Alexander, but after that maybe...

Click to expand...

Greetings, Keroro. I am going to take a look at your Greek map, as I did with Tr0x's Ptolemy map. I enjoy playing around with maps like those, as they represent what the Ancients thought that the world looked like, based on the knowledge that they had. I will see what I can do about passing on some resource locations for both of you. Just remember to put elephants in North Africa for the Carthaginians to use. Also, both of you might want to set Furs to be placed in areas of Plains, as the Egyptians used a lot of antelope hides and also cheetan and lion skins. Ditto for crocodile hides as well.

You mentioned a group working on a Conan mod. Any idea of how to get in contact with them. I have a large size map of Hyborea in an Atlas of Fantasy of mine, and was thinking about trying to put a map together out of it, in conjunction with the information in the Conan books. I have a complete set of the stories by Howard. I even have a miniature war game based on the stories that I can work off of. Mammoth cavalry anyone?

@ Timerover51 - Any comments on the map are greatly appreciated, thanks. I suppose a bit of background might be in order on the history of the map, so I'll edit the first post a bit to give some context. I've already played around with the resources a bit, and you'll be glad to know that I did put African elephants in Carthaginian territory and antelopes around the upper Nile, but any more info on resource placement you can come up with would be great.

I might have jumped the gun there a bit with the Conan mod. I saw the title of this thread in the Creation & Customisation forum, and assumed it was a mod about to come out. But it looks dead now I've actually looked into it . EDIT - Stormrage just confirmed that the thread was a mistake and in the wrong forum, so no Conan mod for the moment.

Still, the map would be fun to have a go at.

Your map is quite an interesting take on the world and I think the idea is great. I would really like to see a map of Europe and the new world like this. It would be fun, don't you think so?


P.S. (This is my first post! Yay.)

White Fox, welcome to CFC .

Thanks for the support, you might also want to check out the Ptolomy map by Tr0x here. If you end up playing a game on one of these alternate maps then please let us know how it goes.

I know that Tr0x was interested in doing a map of how China saw the world when it set off on its voyages of discovery in 1421, if you ask him nicely he might start working on that.

Hmmmm... mabey if he dosen't I might. Anyway, for your first attempt at a map It's great, (And even if it wasn't it would still be great!) I have just finished my first map (of Japan) and I am trying to figure out how to post it so others can download it. I really wish I could play it. ( I have the original Civ III, no Conquests)

I'm way too lazy for this kind of stuff. After over a month of doing nothing I actually got round to adding resources and start locations to this map. The latest version (V1 00) is now playable. But not if you want to play as the US. I strongly advise you not to play as the US.

First post updated with new file for download.

Any feedback would be great.

Why so few civs on such a large map?

Blue Monkey said:

Why so few civs on such a large map?

Click to expand...

I refer you to my previous post about being way too lazy... I'll take a look at it, hang on.

OK, changed the .biq to allow as many civs as you want. I finished adding the resources very late last night and hadn't tested it before I uploaded the file, sorry.

Of course, I would not post This, if it gets done, without your permission, because the map is yours.

I feel honoured.
I was thinking that I might get around to doing that someday, but if you do it then let me know and with your permission I'll post it here.

Posted a Q & D trial (functional scenario rules, random locations) in the other thread. Feel free to muck about and make changes at will. (Open Source Modding at it's best).