A New Soviet World Atlas

Summary

Ian Mumford reviews Atlas Mira, published in 1954 by the Soviet Chief Directorate of Geodesy and Cartography, describing its compilation, map organization, relief representation, and place-name index. Arranged by continent, the atlas contains 261 maps, including 57 covering the Soviet Union; its separate index lists approximately 205,000 names. Mumford praises the clarity of its layer colours, hill shading, and small lettering, comparing its maps of Iceland and Denmark with those in the Times and Touring Club Italiano atlases. He argues that road classifications reflect cartographers’ domestic experience and that universal categories can misrepresent roads’ local importance. He interprets changes from the 1939 Great Soviet Atlas as evidence of new surveys, wartime destruction, and postwar construction, while acknowledging possible security-related omissions, and recommends acquisition by Western libraries.