New materials on the cartography of Mongolia

Summary

This is a review of the 1934 Geographical Atlas of the Mongolian People's Republic, compiled by A.D. Simukov and published bilingually in Russian and Mongolian. The atlas contains 18 maps covering political, physical, administrative, ethnographic, and economic topics. The reviewer, V. Kazakevich, acknowledges the atlas's comprehensive and up-to-date content but focuses on criticizing its system of transcribing geographical names. He argues that the Russian transcription, based on the written Mongolian language, is flawed due to its complexity, artificiality, and disregard for actual pronunciation and dialectal variations. Specific errors are cited, and the author advocates for a transcription system more closely aligned with phonetic reality to enhance the atlas's practical utility.