Introduction to Foreign Atlases: The Times Atlas of the World

Summary

This review traces The Times Atlas from the Europe-heavy 1895 edition through The Times Survey Atlas of the World and the five-volume 1955–1959 Mid-Century Edition, with 122 plates and separate volume indexes, to the one-volume Comprehensive Edition introduced in 1967 and revised and reissued six times by 1980. It describes the comprehensive edition’s use of current cartographic and statistical data and geographical research to update national maps, including roads, reservoirs, railways, rivers and boundaries. Chinese place names were converted to Pinyin, while some major names retained conventional English spellings in parentheses. The author praises the clear printing and roughly 200,000-entry index, considers the world-map projections generally appropriate, but criticizes excessive projection variety among continental maps and inconsistent scales. For the Netherlands, Belgium–Luxembourg and Switzerland maps, the author recommends 1:600,000 to avoid frame breaks and detached supplementary sections and allow better surrounding coverage. The review attributes these layout faults to inadequate overall design and editorial coordination, while commending the atlas’s repeated updating.