The Kieperts’ Asia Minor Ancient and Ottoman: Capstones of Route-Based Cartography

Two ambitious Asia Minor map series by the Kieperts — Heinrich’s lithographed Specialkarte and Richard’s engraved Karte von Kleinasien — are probed here for the first time. What can be recovered about their planning, production, revision and impact from the 1880s through the 1920s forms the main focus, together with their relationship. It is reassessed both with the aid of largely forgotten accompanying texts, and with an Appendix identifying all named informants (over 200) and the expertise each contributed, ranging from geology and archaeology to military intelligence and railroad engineering. Both series — with their double ancient and contemporary focus — emerge as fundamentally Heinrich’s lifelong accomplishment, and as capstones of cartography based principally upon travelers’ itineraries with their inevitable shortcomings. This method remained the sole permissible approach to mapmaking in the Ottoman empire until 1908, by chance also the year when Karte von Kleinasien’s first edition achieved completion. Reviewed finally are the exceptional circumstances in which subsequent editions continued as standard reference tools through the 1920s and even beyond, while the Turkish Republic’s General Staff undertook a triangulated survey.