Africa in 1879
Africa in 1879 was still half a rumor to European mapmakers, and this sheet shows exactly where the guessing stopped. Edward Stanford published it at a moment when the coastline was claimed and the interior was not, so the colored margin of colonial possessions wraps a vast uncolored middle. Political units appear across the more accessible Sahel belt, from the Atlantic along the Niger and around Lake Chad to Darfur and northern Ethiopia. The Sahara, the Congo basin, and the lands further south and east remain open, though East Africa already carries a surprising density of named geographical features.
What the engraving actually labels:
- Towns, countries, and colonial possessions alongside the names of many African tribes
- Deserts and other physical regions, with no physical color applied
- The Congo shown under its earlier name, the Livingstone River
- Latitude and longitude ruled at 10 degree intervals
Map Shop prints this reproduction from the Edward Stanford Cartographic Collection archive, on paper, laminated, foam core mounted, railed, or framed in black or walnut molding.

