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18 Comments

  1. welshpiper
    8 February 2018 @ 5:22 am

    My question is whether (or how much of) this map was fully envisioned in 1981, when Isle of Dread introduced the Known World.

    Reply

    • Thorfinn Tait
      8 February 2018 @ 9:14 am

      I’m reasonably sure the answer is none at all.

      Frank Mentzer provided the world map a few years later, and it seems very likely that he shoehorned the Known World map into it at that point.

      Aside from the timing, the latitudes also point to this being the case, as Mentzer’s map places the southern coast of the Known World at about 25°N, which seems far too far south.

      My 2016 model pushed the countries to roughly match the latitudes given on TM1, so the southern coasts of the Known World are just above 30; that’s still further south than I’d like, but there’s not much else we can do to fix this.

    • shadowmane20
      2 April 2018 @ 9:22 pm

      Why use 8 miles? Go back and look at the history of units of measure. There are other units of measure that will give you more exact detail. I’m not talking about metric. If you use 20 miles per hex, it gives you one scale. English units of measure begin with a barley corn and work up from there. A battle map should use fathoms, which is the measure from the tip of the fingers on one hand to the tip of the fingers on the other hand if they are held straight out to the side. That is the span of a man’s reach. It scales up to a rod, a chain, a furlong and finally a mile. A league is 3 miles.

      I simply think if you’re going to simulate the medieval world, perhaps you should use their units of measure to represent things.

  2. travis
    14 February 2018 @ 2:58 am

    Excellent!

    Reply

  3. Shane Henry
    14 February 2018 @ 1:17 pm

    The other two(?)* maps from “The Once and Future Earth” could be used for the maps of the parallel Mystaras mentioned in CM6: Where Chaos Reigns.

    *(Is there another page of paleo maps in that book?)

    Maybe the next older map (250mya) for the world map of Aelos.

    Reply

  4. Paolo Redaelli
    7 March 2018 @ 6:14 pm

    Just my 2¢€: have you ever looked at http://deeptimemaps.com ?

    Reply

    • Thorfinn Tait
      7 March 2018 @ 6:17 pm

      Yes! Ronald Blakey is the other famous cartographer behind paleogeographic maps. I’ve been a fan of both his and Christopher Scotese’s works for many years now.

  5. Master Set Outer World | Atlas of Mystara
    10 June 2018 @ 5:02 pm

    […] was not posted online until it was unearthed once again in February 2018. For the full story, see this article on […]

    Reply

  6. Let’s Map Mystara 1984 – Thorfinn Tait Cartography
    12 September 2018 @ 3:55 pm

    […] was not posted online until it was unearthed once again in February 2018. For the full story, see this article on […]

    Reply

  7. CM1 Brun | Atlas of Mystara
    6 April 2019 @ 11:27 am

    […] was not posted online until it was unearthed once again in February 2018. For the full story, see this article on […]

    Reply

  8. Let’s Map Mystara 1985 – Thorfinn Tait Cartography
    2 May 2019 @ 9:00 pm

    […] not posted online until it was unearthed once again in February 2018. For the full story, see this article on […]

    Reply

  9. Lining Up Mystara Revisited V – Thorfinn Tait Cartography
    13 June 2019 @ 8:31 pm

    […] my experience with Jurassic Earth, it occurred to me that my hack-up of the Hollow World back in 2016 actually had an unfortunate […]

    Reply

  10. Lining Up Mystara Revisited IV – Thorfinn Tait Cartography
    13 June 2019 @ 8:48 pm

    […] on Facebook, I decided to keep my 2016 model’s hex map-based coastlines. The match with the Jurassic Earth map is really not tight enough to warrant […]

    Reply

  11. Skothar, 72 miles per hex | Atlas of Mystara
    21 June 2019 @ 7:58 pm

    […] of the Earth 135 million years ago (the “Jurassic Earth” map), page […]

    Reply

  12. Jacob
    10 March 2021 @ 12:01 am

    For a modern, 3D version of 150 million year old Earth, see https://dinosaurpictures.org/ancient-earth#150

    Reply

  13. Outer World (1985) | Atlas of Mystara
    23 January 2022 @ 12:00 am

    […] “Jurassic Earth” map (article at Thorfinn Tait Cartography) […]

    Reply

  14. Proto Mystara | Atlas of Mystara
    7 March 2022 @ 8:48 pm

    […] is a whole story behind the discovery and rediscovery of this map, for which see my 2018 article, Jurassic Earth as Mystara. Suffice it to say, it was common knowledge back in the 80s that Mystara’s map was based on a […]

    Reply

  15. Michael C Brown
    25 May 2023 @ 2:06 am

    If I am correct, Alphatia lines up with where Scandinavia would be. So, Sundsvall in Alphatia is close to real world Sundsvall in Sweden.

    Reply

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