Download Ancient Greek Contributions

Historical Development of
Geography
Ancient Greek Contributions
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Five Regions
2 Poles
Equator
Temperate belts
Ancient Greek Contributions
Eratosthenes (276-194BC)
• First use of the term
“Geography”
• 5 climatic regions
– Torrid zone
– Frigid zones
– Temperate bands
• Early map
Ancient Greek Contributions
Hipparchus (180-125BC)
• Latitudes and
longitudes
• Grade grid
• Located latitudes for
many places
Ancient Greek Contributions
Thales of Miletus (624-546BC)
• World based on water
• Mathematical rules
• Geometry to measure
land area
Ancient Greek Contributions
• Anaximander
• Cylindrical world
• Herodotus Histories
• Big book
• Rivers/Deltas
• Wind patterns
•Pythagoras
• Spherical world
Ancient Greek Contributions
Aristotle (384-322BC)
• Pythagoras is right!
• Earth’s shadow
• Stars
Roman Contributions
• Strabo (63BC-24AD)
• Geography - 17 volumes
• Sphere in a sphere
• Ptolemy (100-170AD)
• Guide to Geography
Ancient China
• Fei Xiu
• Father of Chinese cartography
• 267 AD – Map of China
Middle Ages
Muslim Geographers
• Al-Idrisi (1100-1165?)
• 1154 World Map and Text
• Ibn Battuta (1304-1368?)
• Rihlah (Travels) – 3
decades of travel
Middle Ages
Muslim Geographers
• Al-Jahiz
• Environment and physical characteristics
• Origins of skin color?
• Abu Rayhan al-Buruni
• Mathematical geography
• Pin pointing location
• Radius of the Earth = 6339.6 km
European Explorers
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Erik the Red – Greenland
Bjarni Jerjulfsson – Newfoundland
Leif Eriksson – Newfoundland
Christopher Columbus – “America”
Geography Grows As A Science
• Immanuel Kant
(1724-1804)
• Scientific knowledge
• Logical Classification
• Physical Classification
Two Opposing Views
Environmental Determinism
• Alexander von Humboldt (1769-1859)
and Carl Ritter (1779-1859)
• Physical, mental, moral habits
influenced by natural environment
• Physical environment causes social
development
Two Opposing Views
Environmental Determinism
• Freidrich Ratzel (1844-1904) and
Ellen Churchill (1863-1932)
• Geography = study of influences of
the natural environment on people
• Ellsworth Huntington (1876-1947)
• Climate the major determinant of
civilization
Cultural Ecology
• Geographic approach emphasizing
human-environment relationships
• Modern geographers
• NOT Environmental Determinism
• BUT Possibilism
• Physical environment may limit some actions,
but people can adjust to their environment
Regional Studies
• France –
th
19
century
• Regional Studies AKA Cultural Landscape
• Paul Vidal de la Blache (1845-1918) and
Jean Brunhes (1869-1930)
• Americans Carl Sauer (1889-1975) and
Robert Platt (1880-1950)
• Distinctive landscapes from a combination of
social relationships and physical processes
• Everything is interrelated