Mapmaking
While mapmaking usually aims at collapsing tridimensional space into a two-dimensional representation, this
Map of the Day and Night Stations joins both space and time onto a plane surface, adding a temporal
dimension to the cartographic endeavor. The map displays the route out and the route back. It was time, and
not space, that dictated the scale and format of the map. Each two-page spread (21 X 22 cm) corresponds to
one day of travel, stretching out to form a 608 cm long continuous accordion folded book. The scale of this
map then could be considered at 0.875 cm per hour—except for the first day of the tour that takes up two
sheets, to accommodate an extra overnight stop on the return. This temporal map thus reads like a diary of
the journey, taking the reader along day and night stops, river crossings, temples, mountainous areas,
coastal routes, and more. The distances between each night station are marked along the top corners of every
two-page spread for the outward journey, and along the lower corners for the return journey. The map
emphasizes the movement of the Emperor in space and time, highlighting where he stopped on the way and the
landscape surrounding him, rather than the infrastructure and manpower of this tour. Like a personal diary,
it offers an intimate perspective on the tour, bringing together the genres of cartographic representation
and court diary into a unique route map. The map was not meant to be displayed as a decorative object, but
was a documentary record that could be folded into a 21 X 11 cm book and archived alongside other folded
documents of the same size.
This map’s innovations were not limited to the temporal scaling; the map was also multilingual, combining the Chinese and the Manchu languages in ways that mirrored the spatio-temporal intersectionality of the map itself. While Manchu was primarily used for toponyms; the Chinese script recorded the distances traveled. In other words, the Manchu language marked space, while the Chinese labels rendered time. More broadly, the bilingual form of the map reflected the combination of multiple linguistic and cultural traditions that formed part of the Qing rule over China and Inner Asia.
In addition, the map artist(s) depicted mountains along the top as continuous and indistinguishable, without attempting a realistic portrayal of the actual topography, but simply providing a basic illustration of an ongoing landscape that frames the straight red line of the journey. Another important consideration when viewing this map, is that the straight red line was the imperial pathway and thus the landscape is presented relationally in deference to the emperor’s passage through space. In other words the landscape visually conforms to the emperor’s movement through this imagined space.
This map’s innovations were not limited to the temporal scaling; the map was also multilingual, combining the Chinese and the Manchu languages in ways that mirrored the spatio-temporal intersectionality of the map itself. While Manchu was primarily used for toponyms; the Chinese script recorded the distances traveled. In other words, the Manchu language marked space, while the Chinese labels rendered time. More broadly, the bilingual form of the map reflected the combination of multiple linguistic and cultural traditions that formed part of the Qing rule over China and Inner Asia.
In addition, the map artist(s) depicted mountains along the top as continuous and indistinguishable, without attempting a realistic portrayal of the actual topography, but simply providing a basic illustration of an ongoing landscape that frames the straight red line of the journey. Another important consideration when viewing this map, is that the straight red line was the imperial pathway and thus the landscape is presented relationally in deference to the emperor’s passage through space. In other words the landscape visually conforms to the emperor’s movement through this imagined space.