The Nation Survey’d: Essays on Late Sixteenth‐Century Scotland as Depicted by Timothy Pont

Citation

James, S. (2002), "The Nation Survey’d: Essays on Late Sixteenth‐Century Scotland as Depicted by Timothy Pont", Library Review, Vol. 51 No. 9, pp. 487-488. https://doi.org/10.1108/lr.2002.51.9.487.13

Reminiscent of Victor Kayam who so liked the product he bought the company, I was so impressed at the official launch of the National Library of Scotland’s Pont Web site that on the spot I booked the traveling exhibition for my library; and so popular was it already that I shall not see it arrive until February 2003. Knowing the project and having used the Pont Web site I find some difficulty in concentrating this review on the book rather than the wider issues raised: but those issues are significant in any context.

We don’t really know why, but between about 1583 and 1596 the young Timothy Pont, fresh from study at St Andrews University, traveled Scotland mapping the country and gathering a mass of local information in the process. A total of 77 of his original maps have survived to become one of the great treasures of the National Library of Scotland. Too fragile for much consultation or even display, they were an obvious candidate for digitization. A meticulous, scholarly and technically outstanding project achieved that goal, and the results may now be viewed on the NLS Web site (http://www.nls.uk/pont/index.html). The project itself is not treated in any detail in this volume, but what is provided is a fascinating set of essays giving such historical and biographical background as is known and setting Pont’s extraordinary enterprise and achievement in a scholarly historical and geographical context.

The collection begins, naturally, with Pont himself: in truth, precious little is known about the man, but what is known is recorded and discussed by Jeffrey Stone, who also explains how Pont’s work has been preserved, used and abused subsequently. Michael Lynch sets Pont in his historical, social and intellectual context, then Christopher Fleet and Jeffrey Stone analyse his writing and use of symbols in some detail. Other experts then contribute chapters discussing Pont and place names, woodland in his maps, Pont and Scotland’s mountains, his drawings of buildings and his portrayal of towns. These last two features are among the more remarkable aspects of his maps. Unhappily, maps of Ayrshire do not survive, but that of Paisley depicts roads, buildings and physical features still recognisable today. The final essay, by Charles Withers, discusses chorography, mapmaking and national identity in the late sixteenth century, establishing Pont even more firmly in his context. The volume is completed by a very comprehensive bibliography and thorough index. It is illustrated throughout, mainly with images of the maps, in colour and monochrome and the essays are fully referenced.

Perhaps that sounds all rather scholarly and specialist: it is, but do not be fooled. This is accessible scholarship illuminating a wonderful original resource which itself is now made more generally accessible by the wonders of digitization (and a well‐designed Web site), and by a traveling exhibition giving the material the publicity and exposure it merits. The original maps, later to become the basis for Blaeu’s 1654 atlas of Scotland, are fascinating even without further explanation; with the background information and context supplied here they take on even greater significance. Every library in Scotland and any library concerned with Scottish history or topography in any way or to any degree should bookmark the Web site and buy the book.