57

Imperialism, colonialism and cartography

JEFFREY C. STONE
Senior Lecturer, Department of Geography, University of Aberdeen, Aberdeen AB9 2UF
Revised MS received 9 March, 1987
ABSTRACT
The centenary of the Berlin conference of 1884-85 was an opportunity for historians to reiterate the view that the
conference was not convened to partition Africa. It follows from the imperial function of the conference that subsequent
colonialism was a short-lived aberration in four centuries of a continuing imperial relationship between Europe and Africa.
The established attributes which differentiate imperialism from colonialism provide a framework for understanding the
cartographic evolution of Africa. The long-standing view of an eighteenth century cartographic reformation of Africa is
challenged. Pre-colonial cartography of Africa is, instead, characterized by methodological continuity, which is still evident
in the cartography of the nineteenth century European explorers, whereas the major discontinuity coincides with the
beginnings of colonial rule. The cartographic requirements for the implementation of colonial rule on the ground are
different from those which foster a more remote imperial relationship. The attributes of imperial cartography are now
reasserting themselves in the post-colonial period.
KEY WORDS. Africa, Reinterpretation of evidence, Cartography, Imperialism, Colonialism, Exploration

Erroneous interpretations of historical events tend to

persist, despite the best efforts of historians to rectify
matters. In looking at the origins of colonialism in
Africa, cartographic historians as well as historical
and political geographers seem unaware of the
interpretation which diplomatic historians now place
on a famous nineteenth century meeting. The consequence for cartographic historiography is that a
significant change in the characteristic content of the
evolving cartography of Africa has been overlooked,
whilst the nature and origins of an earlier phase
of change has been misunderstood. If European
pre-eminence in cartography and map-making determined what constitutes Africa, regardless of cultural
history (Mazrui, 1986, p. 101), then the continents
cartographic history is no mundane or esoteric
subject.
The meeting in question is the fourteen-power
Berlin conference on Africa of 1884-85, whose centenary was recently marked by at least six academic
conferences. Fierce controversy was aroused by the
announcement of some of these events, which were
erroneously seen as celebrating the anniversary of the
launching of colonial partition (Hargreaves, 1984),
but historians of Africa have long been at pains to
emphasize that the Berlin Conference did not mark
Trans. Inst. Geogr. N.S. 13: 57-64 (1988) ISSN: 0020-2754

the beginnings of partition (Crowder, 1968; Fage,

1969; Hargreaves, 1974). The Berlin Conference was
convened because collaborative arrangements on
which European states had hitherto relied were beginning to break down (Hargreaves, 1985a). Continued
commercial access to Africa was the common objective, not control of its territory. What has been
described as the old system of free trade imperialism
in West Africa was threatened (Hargreaves, 1985b,
p. 21). Admittedly, the conference proved ineffective
in constraining the champions of partition. The Berlin
provisions proved inadequate, as the devices of
treaty and protectorate were perforce utilized to
obtain control inland, but the recognition of the
Berlin conference as a meeting of imperialists not
colonialists and the identification of the differing attributes of imperialism and colonialism has significance
for our understanding of the cartographic evolution
of Africa, which requires reappraisal.
The term imperialism has come to mean the
control of the weak by the rich and powerful, not
necessarily by means of the exercise of direct authority. It is an appropriate term for the long-standing
relationship between Europe and Africa which the
Berlin Conference was convened to defend, that is
the traditional free-trading system at the coasts of the
Printed in Great Britain

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JEFFREY C. STONE
continent. The freedom was for Europeans to compete blank spaces as early as 1666 by Vossius (Randles,
for trade, not for Africans to obstruct it (Hargreaves,
1956), while the Ptolemaic tradition of Africa was
1984) and the imperial relationship was essentially itself replete with blank spaces and the use of the
international in character, being based on mutuality word incognita.
Sixteenth and seventeenth century cartography
of interests among European powers. The European
international imperialism which was promoted in employed such contemporary sources as were availBerlin in 1884 is equally evident in the founding of able and made significant changes in the depiction of
the International African Association at the Brussels Africa (Ouwinga, 1975) in the same way that James
Geographical Conference in 1876 (Bridges, 1980) and MacQueen (1856) made substantial changes to the
indeed it is a relationship which can be traced back map of Central Africa in the nineteenth century, albeit
through at least four centuries. By contrast, the period with different subject matter and quality of data. Just
of direct European colonial rule which began never- as Almeida was critical of previous depictions of
theless in the 1890s and which is differentiated by Ethiopia in the seventeenth century (Skelton, 1958),
parochial European nationalism and exclusivity, can so eighteenth century cartographers reacted to the
be regarded as an abnormal and brief but influential work of their predecessors, given new sources to
interlude in the imperial relationship between Africa hand. There is methodological continuity linking
and Europe. The relatively ephemeral nature of eighteenth century and both earlier and later
colonialism by contrast with imperialism in Africa is cartographers,
The critical circumstances for methodological conemphasized by projecting forward to the postcolonial period, for example to the successive tinuity in the mapping of Africa over four centuries by
negotiations of the Lome Conventions between the cartographers from several European countries was
EEC and the largely African ACP states. Only tiny movement of information about Africa within Europe.
residuals of European colonialism remain in Africa Certainly, commercial competition meant that the
but the very long standing imperial relationship is navigational information of the Dutch, for example,
arguably evolving. European imperialism in Africa is remained secret (Ouwinga, 1975). Nevertheless, origcharacterized by collaborative internationalism and inal information about Africa did disseminate within
historical continuity, whereas colonialism was a Europe under the commercial impetus of publication.
relatively brief assertion of competitive European Perhaps the most striking example, which challenges
nationalism. The difference has great significance the conception of the eighteenth century French
in understanding the cartographic evolution of school as innovatory in its critical attitudes or its
sources, and also demonstrates the manner in which
Africa.
Pre-colonial cartography of the interior of Africa information disseminated for commercial gain, is the
has long been seen as dividing into two distinct
1665 Portuguese Atlas of Africa by Joao Teixeira
phases, which are of debatable validity and which Albernaz II. The atlas was commissioned by a
obscure the reality of the forces operative. The earlier Frenchman and together with other Portuguese
source material, it was used to transform previous
phase is characterized by its use of Ptolemaic conceptions, particularly for the source of the Nile, and is depictions of the Zambezi basin by Jaillot (1678) a
Frenchman, by Berry (1680) an Englishman and by
epitomized by the eight-sheet map of Africa of 1564
Coronelli (168.3) a Venetion, in their maps of Africa,
by Gastaldi whose subsequent influence is apparent in
before inspiring De LIsle and dAnville (Corteso
the depictions of Africa by Ortelius (1570), Speed
(1627), Blaeu (1642) and others. Supposedly, the and da Mota, 1960). In the past, the commercial and
strategic divisions within Europe have been stressed
turning point in the cartography of Africa is located in
in seeking to comprehend the evolving early carthe Age of Reason, in the maps of the French school,
tography of Africa, but it is the facility with which
notably De LIsle (1700) and dAnville (1727) (Tooley,
1969). A scientific approach lead to the removal of Portuguese information disseminated throughout
Europe in the form of the printed map which is
many legends and assumptions by the innovators
striking. This is understandable, given the essentially
who achieved marked gains in accuracy and were
collaborative nature of European imperialism towards
famous for their blank spaces (Lane-Poole, 1950;
Klemp, 1968; Tooley, Bricker and Crone, 1976;
Africa.
The pre-colonial cartographic depiction of Africa
Wallis, 1986) which are allegedly indicative of a
represents evolution not transformation. The concept
scientific attitude of mind. But contemporary wisdom
about the interior of Africa was set aside in favour of of an eighteenth century reformation derives from

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the members of the expedition. As a Swiss national,
Bertrand could have had little interest in promoting
colonialism by his native land. As a result of his visit
to the Paris Evangelical Missionary Society station at
Sefula during the expedition, he in fact devoted a great
deal of time and effort throughout the remaining
twenty-seven years of his life to raising financial and
moral support throughout Europe for the Barotseland
and Basutoland missions. The detailed map of The
Kingdom of the Marutse in his book (Fig. I), with its
many scientifically authentic latitudinal observations
inscribed on the map and its primary concern with
physical features (also mission stations) observed by
the travellers, is appropriate to the imperial (as
opposed to colonial) interests which Bertrand promoted throughout Europe so philanthropically and
vigorously.
The cartographic transition from imperialism to
colonialism tends to lag behind the legal transformation. Maps in the imperial mould continued to be
published into the colonial period, for example, maps
depicting the territory under the administration of the
British South Africa Company published by Edward
Stanford between 1895 and 1906. Although these
were compiled with the assistance of a company
who eventually came to govern all of Northern and
Southern Rhodesia, their function is primarily the
prosecution of commercial activities, as shown by the
many descriptive entries on the maps, extolling
the farming and ranching potential of various parts of
the country.
The great change to maps deriving from the colonial rather than the imperial function is contemporaneous with first efforts to establish administrations
on the ground, usually some short time after the
formal proclamation by the colonial authority. The
maps reflect the needs of the nascent administrative
systems, as is exemplified by the first District Officer
to be stationed in what was then the Balovale District
of northern Rhodesia, who refers to his first long
tour, as trying to make a census of the people and a
map of the country (Venning, 1955, p. 55). His map
has none of the instrumentally-derived precision of
the earlier travellers in the region. It is inaccurate
(Stone, 1977) and its subject matter is predominantly
the location of the local populace. It was a functional
administrative tool and an example of a great many
colonial district maps (Stone, 1982) which locate rural
settlement in unprecedented detail.
The usual reason why professional Colonial
Survey Officers frequently did not compile the maps
necessary for the imposition of colonial rule was

Imperialism and cartography

analysis of form, not process, that is from the external

for of the end product, the change of map content,
as ethnographic descriptions and perspective drawings of hills were removed and as new information
lead to the abandonment of some long-standing
delineations of parts of the interior. It is in any case an
illusion. Those particular changes in content are not
exclusive to the eighteenth century. Furthermore, the
manner in which African maps were compiled in the
eighteenth century was little altered.
The great cartographic watershed for Africa relates
to the replacement of remote imperial influence with
direct colonial authority. In cartographic terms, the
transition is primarily a twentieth century process
which does not properly include the well known
maps of the interior of Africa by eighteenth and
nineteenth century European explorers. There is little
evidence of a direct connection between the explorations of men such as Livingstone, Speke, Grant and
Stanley and the initiation of colonialism. Rather, the
connection is with the unofficial mind (Bridges,
1982, p. 18) of imperialism which was located in the
commercial middle class of British society, in servicemen and officials, businessmen and missionary
leaders, and in the membership of the African Association which was founded in 1788 and quickly became
involved in the problem of the source, course and
termination of the Niger. The maps themselves were
based on instrumental observation which added a
scientific dimension to the travellers records, an
important civilizing clement in legitimizing the
European penetration, presence and even interference
in Africa in the eyes of the unofficial mind. However,
the unofficial scramble for Africa by the commercial
and service classes was an imperial manifestation
to be differentiated from the subsequent and not
unrelated but more direct intervention by European
governments.
An archetypal example of a traveller in the imperialist mould is Alfred Bertrand, a Swiss army captain
who was one of a four-man expedition of exploration
to north-west Rhodesia in 1895. Bertrand was to
become President of the Geographical Society of
Geneva and a Vice-President of the Ninth International Geographical Congress in Geneva. He was a
member of ten European geographical societies,
mostly honorary, including the Royal Geographical
Society (Bertrand, 1926). The account of his travels
in north-west Rhodesia was published in French
(Bertrand, 1898) and English and includes the map
compiled by the Royal Geographical Society in
association with the lecture to the Society in 1897 by

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]EFFREY C. STONE

primarily that where they existed, they were fully

employed in the pressing task which also derived
from the imposition of colonial authority but

necessitated a high order of professional expertise,

namely cadastral mapping for the purposes of demarcating townships and building plots, roads, railways,

61
the prolonged and otherwise uninterrupted imperial
relationship between Europe and Africa, then sufficient time should have elapsed by now for evidence
of the traits of imperialism to be reasserting
themselves. Debatably, the evidence is present in
the negotiations between the EEC and its African
Associates in the context of the Lom Conventions.
Equally contentiously, there is cartographic evidence
deriving from the former Directorate of Overseas
Surveys (hereafter DOS), a colonial institution in
origin, which had assumed the broader role of an
agency for technical aid to overseas governments. As
McGrath (1983) demonstrates, there is continuity of
purpose in the relationship between DOS and firstly
the then dependencies of the UK, and eventually the
newly independent countries, continuity which was
in part a product of the local autonomy of the former
dependencies. Nevertheless, the changed nature of
the political relationship did bring about change in
the cartographic product, not unrelated to the reformation of British aid policy after the creation of a
Ministry of Overseas Development in 1964. In the
post-independence period, the Directorate has of
course been obliged to take account of UK government policy on aid in project selection. It is in this
context that changes in product must be seen, as for
example, in carrying out cadastral survey (once the
hallmark of colonial surveys and now of the surveys
of independent governments), most notably in
support of the scheme to resettle African small
holders on farms purchased from Europeans in the
Highlands of Kenya; or in the formation of the Land
Resources Division of DOS in 1964 to produce a
range of maps related to land use: or the successful
joint projects of DOS which were specifically
designed as vehicles for technology transfer. Then,
the extensive programmes of large scale topographic
mapping which were mounted by the Directorate
of Commonwealth Surveys (DCS) throughout large
parts of former British Africa in the years preceding
independence may be seen to have their origins in the
gradual reassertion of imperial policy over colonial
policy, to meet the needs of post-war Britain for
reliable sources of primary products in circumstances
of impending political change in Africa. It was this
writers experience that the colonial administrator on
the ground had little need of the topographic cover
which latterly became available. The significant
feature is not that one type of map is always to be
associated with colonialism or with imperialism,
(since neither function is static), but that change in
cartographic usage will occur in the transition from

Imperialism, colonialism and cartography

alienated land, reserved land and all of the other

boundaries that were a part of colonial imposition.
The importance of this second type of colonial map
which was a product of the change from imperial to
colonial control, IS evident from the necessity for
Colonial Surveys to resort to unsophisticated compilation techniques in publishing early topographic
series (Stone, 1984), sometimes employing the
amateur work of the District Officer (Fig. 2). Overall,
progress on the provision of large scale topographic
map cover in British colonial Africa was slow. The
reason why the Federal Surveys of Rhodesia and
Nyasaland was able to publish such a large number of
large-scale topographic sheets of Northern and
Southern Rhodesia during its short life span from
1956 to 1964, was in part the paucity of coverage
achieved in the previous half century of colonial rule.
However, the association of colonial map making
with cadastral surveys at the expense of topographic
survey, is nowhere better demonstrated than in South
Africa. The method which Potter established in 1657
to record rights in land at the Cape (Fisher, 1984,
p. 58) IS still in use today, but the country made
little progress towards the provision of adequate
topographic cover until the reorganization of the
Trigonometrical Survey Office in 1936 (Liebenberg,
1979), long after the end of colonial rule.
A further differentiating factor between imperialism and colonialism which is supported by the cartographic evidence, is the removal of the international
dimension with the imposition of colonial rule. This is
recognized, for example, by McGrath (1976), whose
study of British East Africa specifically excludes the
German contribution to the mapping of its former
territory. The nationalistic parochialism of the colonial
period was carried to its ultimate in the decentralized
administrative system of former British Africa in
which territories were treated as separate and selfcontained units (Jeffries, 1956). In consequence, there
is great variation between the former British territories
as to the amount and type of topographic mapping
which was carried out. For example, an early start on
topographic survey was made in Uganda by comparison with Northern Rhodesia, although Uganda is
renowned for the very early Mailo Survey of
Buganda which was an experiment in land settlement
and exemplifies the pre-eminence of cadastral work in
the colonial period. Each European colonial power
went its own way in devising, or not devising, its
own programme of surveys and each British territory
did likewise.
If colonialism was a relatively brief aberration in

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JEFFREY C. STONE

the one political status to the other by virtue of

differing functions.
Latterly, DOS was devoting a decreasing pro-

portion of its effort in Africa to former British

territories with programmes of work or training
provision for Ethiopia, Liberia, Chad and Madagascar

Imperialism, colonialism and cartography

(Directorate of Overseas Surveys, 1985). Not only

was a more internationalist attitude to Africa
becoming apparent, but with the responsibilities of
the Directorate now transferred to the Ordnance
Surveys Overseas Surveys Directorate and with
much overseas work to be transferred to the private
sector (McGrath, 1982) we may see commercial firms
perhaps from several European countries working
under Ordnance Survey and Overseas Development
Agency supervision, thus restoring the commercial
and international dimensions of European cartography in Africa which were associated with
seventeenth and eighteenth century imperialism.
Recent writing (e.g., Griffiths, 1986; Either, 1986)
still does not always accept that the delegates to
the Berlin Conference of 1884-85 were not talking
about partitioning Africa (Hargreaves, 1984, p. 17)
and that it was a last-ditch attempt to sustain Europes
traditionally internationalist approach of common
access to Africa. Nevertheless, differentiation
between the historical continuity of the imperialist
mercantile ethic which was still on display in Berlin a
century ago and its brief demise in direct colonial rule
provides a framework for challenging long-standing
Interpretations of pre-colonial cartographic evolution
and for appreciating the prime characteristics of
colonial surveys. It also provides a stimulus to further
work on colonial cartography, in the form of a
hypothesis which envisages disparate and comparatively uncoordinated activity across seven shortlived spheres of European rule. Although brief, it was
an important phase of map making, since it perforce
provided the bases for both the cadastral and the
topographic surveys of the independent nations of
Africa, who are now restored to a more indirect, if not
Imperial relationship with Europe.

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