Circular city cartography
Introduction
The Babylonian Map of the World (or Imago Mundi) is a Babylonian clay tablet written in Akkadian, containing a conceptualized representation of the known world, with a short and partially lost description, dating from approximately the century BC. C. (Neo-Babylonian or early Achaemenid period).
The map is centered on the Euphrates, flowing from the north to the south.
The city of Babylon "Babylon (city)") is shown on the Euphrates, in the northern half of the map. The mouth of the Euphrates is labeled “swamp” and “drain.” Susa, the capital of Elam, is shown to the south, Urartu to the northeast, and Habban, the capital of the Kassites, is shown (incorrectly) to the northwest. Mesopotamia is surrounded by a circular "bitter river" or ocean (Ocean (mythology)), and eight "regions", represented as triangular sections, are shown beyond the ocean. It has been suggested that the representation of these regions as triangles could indicate that they were imagined as mountains.[1]
The tablet was discovered in Sippar, in the Baghdad valiate, about 60 km north of Babylon on the east bank of the Euphrates River. The text was first translated in 1889.[2] The clay tablet is in the British Museum (BM 92687).[3].
Description of mapped areas
The map is circular with two defined outer circles. Cuneiform labels all locations within the circular map, as well as some regions outside. The two outer circles represent the water in the middle and are labeled maratum "bitter river", the salt sea. Babylon "Babylon (city)") north of map center; the parallel lines at the bottom seem to represent the marshes of the south, and a curved line coming from the north, northeast seems to represent the Zagros Mountains.[4].
There are seven small inner circles in the perimeter areas within the circle, and they appear to represent seven cities. Eight triangular sections on the outer circle (water perimeter) represent “regions” called (nagu). The description of five of them has survived.[3].
Carlo Zaccagnini has argued that the design of the Babylonian map of the world may have persisted in the T in O map of the European Middle Ages.[5].