For this exercise I choose The World Atlas of Pirates, one of the specific maps I picked was named “The Rise and Fall of the Barbarossa Brothers” located on pages 46 and 47. On this particular map there was a key that described the Barbarossa Brother’s trade routes, the pirate’s raids, and their battlefields. Since the key is showing routes, they were represented with lines and the battlefields were displayed as two swords clashing together. Furthermore, this map did not have a scale to show the distances the pirates journeyed, but it did have a blue and red compass in the top right hand corner. Additionally, this map does not clearly state what kind of projection it is, but I noticed that it has some topographical features such as triangles …show more content…
At first glance I noticed, again, that there was no specific projection, nor scale. But, there was a key depicting the Spanish Main’s naval patrol routes and their forts. The area this map does show, however, is the south coast of the United States to the northern part of South America. Additionally, I noticed that this map has a few interesting features, similar to the previous one such as: topography of mountains and rivers, a compass, and numbered bubbles that correspond to events on page 59. Overall, I like the maps that I picked because they truly do tell a story about pirates, despite the fact that they do not have a scale or projection. Moreover, what I gather from this map of the Spanish Main is that they dominated the islands of Cuba, Hispaniola, and Puerto Rico along with parts of the coast from North and South America. Interestingly, it looks like the Spanish Main had a fort near the Panama Canal, which leads me to think this was established for trading reasons. Also, I would feel comfortable drawing the conclusion that the Spanish Main seemed to be a strong empire because of how many forts they had and how spread out they are. I really enjoy these maps because they give a true sense to how pirates functioned and did it in an aesthetically pleasing