Atlas of Belgium

A. de Ghellinck presents the rationale and compilation plans for Atlas de Belgique. He describes national atlases as systematic, explanatory accounts of a country’s geography, useful for scientific research, administration and economic activity, and for informing foreign audiences. A survey of international precedents includes his concern that the planned Swiss atlas gives utilitarian subjects excessive weight. The Belgian project developed from Pergameni’s 1932 proposal for about twenty maps to Michotte and Lefèvre’s expanded 1937 plan for about fifty plates; publication in fascicles was approved in 1938, subject to funding. War halted committee activity, while some contributors continued preparing maps. Established in 1946, the Atlas Commission defines subjects and treatments, recruits specialists, reviews drafts and presentation methods, and submits final map drafts to the Belgian National Committee of Geography for approval. Authors remain directly responsible for their signed maps. The planned folio contains forty-nine plates covering physical, human, economic, regional and political geography. Most plates would include a general map at 1:500,000, while others would combine smaller maps at varying scales. Language arrangements were still to be resolved to reflect the atlas’s national character. The Military Geographical Institute undertook production, and a state subsidy supported the work. De Ghellinck expresses confidence in its presentation and reports the committee’s conditional hope of publishing several plates before the end of 1947.