Reviews: Atlas of the Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic

Summary

The review situates the 1961 Atlas of the Armenian SSR within Soviet comprehensive atlas publishing. It describes its compilation by dozens of contributors from the Geography Department of the Armenian Academy of Sciences’ Institute of Geology and other institutes, with an editorial team headed by A. B. Bagdasarian. Its six sections comprise a preface, introductory maps, natural conditions, population, economy, and history. The reviewer praises the graphic quality and detailed treatment of the natural environment, particularly geological, climatic, and hydrological mapping. The population section includes Armenian dispersal and repatriation, but lacks maps of settlement types and functions. Economic maps occupy about 35% of the atlas. The reviewer criticizes industrial maps for unspecified size categories and inadequate representation of industrial structure, which obstruct comparisons; some agricultural maps also conceal absolute values. Other agricultural maps and economic syntheses receive favorable attention. Despite these weaknesses, the reviewer judges the atlas a coherent, rich source on Armenia, useful for economic practitioners and a model worth following for national atlases.