Is there a map store in Taipei? I’m looking for an antique map of Taiwan.
A search of ‘antique map’ turned upthis relevant thread -- hope this helps!
Antique maps of Taiwan frequently show up on Ebay. One famous map recently displayed at the historical museum in Taipei was just sold on Ebay for several thousands of dollars, but there are more affordable ones, too.
Regards,
Marc
I saw a replica at the NPM gift shop.
Nantian 南天 bookstore on Wenzhou St (south end, a search should pull up the exact address) has prints of some old maps.
Taiouan Bookstore, Lane 76, No. 6, Xinsheng South Rd. (across from National Taiwan University)
I have this impression that I once wrote a long post about how and why the European cartographers used to draw Taiwan as 3 separate islands, but I can’t seem to find that one…
Anyway… got a few old maps I like to share and have idea where to put them. So I’m reviving this old thread.
India Orientalis Insularumque Adiacienti um Typus by Abraham Ortelius, 1590
Imperii Sinarum Nova Descriptio by Jan Van Loon, published in Amsterdam, 1658
職方大一統總圖. I can’t find any reference to this map, except for a Ming dynasty official map book called 皇明職方地圖. It might be a remake of that map, of unknown date.
Fujian area
If the later two maps are indeed authentic and made at least in Early Qing dynasty (hence dropping the 皇明 part from 皇明職方地圖), then it’s interesting to note that on the mainland map, there’s a island labelled as “雞籠 澹水 (Ke-lang and Tām-tsuí)” while on the Fujian area map, the same island is labelled as "雞浪 湛水 (Ke-lōng and Tām-tsuí). I marked the spellings in Taigi, and the two versions are nearly identical, but the Chinese part is very different, and it signifies two things.
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These are phonetic translations, and recent phonetic translations around the time of the making of that map. It’s part of the season why the same location gets different transliteration in the same set of maps.
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The names were transliterated using Holo or an Sinitic language similar to Holo. 澹 and 湛 sounds different in Mandarin, 澹 is Dan and 湛 is Zhan.
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Ke-lang and Tām-tsuí isn’t a place where Han Chinese lived, or visited. Local inhabitants also did not used Chinese characters. The transliteration of Ryukyu in historical documents were also erratic at first, some used 流求 some used other forms. When merchants began frequent bi-lateral visits, and the kingdom of Ryukyu adopted Hanji, the transliteration was set to 琉球 and it was stuck.
The fact these two maps from the set had different transliterations for two of the most frequently mentioned locations in Taiwan, shows how little Han Chinese knew about Taiwan.
The maps also drew 彭湖 (Penghu) and 北港 (Beigang) as one island. Don’t know the deal with that, but the name Beigang in Taiwan also changed several locations through out Chinese colonization. It is highly unlikely that Beigang in the map refers to present day Beigang, as they would have not been to present day Beigang.
The map also listed another place called 小琉球 (Ryukyu minor). It almost seems like those European maps that divided Taiwan up into 3 separate islands.
Apparently it was completed in 1636. So despite definitely having Ming officials visited the island, and told the Dutch to go to at least part of the island, the Ming cartographers still thought there are at least 2 islands, one possibly connected to Penghu.
Chatgpt has this to say:
This is an old East Asian map. The text is in classical Chinese characters, and the title on the right reads:
大一統總圖
(Dà yī tǒng zǒng tú)
“General Map of the Great Unification”
This kind of map was common in the Ming and Qing dynasties (China), and also in Korean and Japanese contexts, often influenced by Chinese cartography.
Looking closer:
The landmass depicted is Korea (朝鮮, Joseon), as seen in the large label toward the right center (“朝鮮”).
To the lower right are the Ryukyu Islands (大琉球國).
The sea area mentions 日本 (Japan) and “倭寇” (Japanese pirates).
The upper right mentions parts of China (建州, 奉天, 福餘, etc.).
This suggests it is a Korean-produced map (probably Joseon dynasty, 18th–19th century), showing Korea as the central focus, with surrounding states and seas for reference.
Would you like me to translate the main inscriptions and geographic labels (like place names and regions), or would you prefer a historical background about when and why this map was made?
Then in relation to Taiwan:
Yes — Taiwan is depicted on this map, but not in the way we would expect from a modern map.
If you look towards the bottom right side, in the sea area south of the Korean peninsula and east of China, you’ll find the label:
小琉球 (Xiao Liuqiu, “Small Ryukyu”)
In many Korean and Chinese maps from the 16th–18th centuries, Taiwan was often referred to as “小琉球” (Little Ryukyu), to distinguish it from 大琉球 (Great Ryukyu, Okinawa/Ryukyu Kingdom).
大琉球國 (Great Ryukyu) is written more prominently a bit eastward in the map.
小琉球 (Taiwan) appears closer to the Chinese coast, below the area representing Fujian.
No hallucinations at all. ChatGPT is getting very good with analyzing images.
The Selden map. This map was in John Selden’s collection, and was given to his alma mater, University of Oxford, in his 1653 will. It became Bodleian’s collections in 1659. It was rediscovered by historian Robert Batchelor in 2008.
The map was likely made between 1606 and before 1624, likely in Manila. People have attributed it to have been commisioned by Nicholas Iquan Gaspard, aka Zheng Zhilong, or Koxinga’s dad.
According to this article, the cartography who made the Selden map had roots in Fujian because he draw Ming China in a very Fujian way, which is the 2 capitals and 13 provinces of Ming China are shown to be divided by rivers.
That obviously wasn’t the case, but that cartography style was specifically unique to Fujian in that period. Someone in Fujian must had confused provincial boarders with rivers, and subsequent Hokkien cartographers never bothered to fix it.
Then, many phonetic place names only make sense if you read it in the Tsiang-tsiu langauge (漳州話). For example, there’s a place labeled 魚难島 (Taigi: hî-lân-tó), which is Hirado (平戶), 笼仔沙机 (Taigi: láng-á-sa-ki) is Nagasaki (長崎), and 水剩馬 (Taigi: tsuí-sīn-má) is Tsushima (對馬).
The fact that Japanese place names were recorded phonetically also could be an indicator to the cartographer referencing contemporary Portuguese maps. Kyushu island is drawn as connected to Honshu, which also aligns with Portuguese maps at the time. Other signs that it was referencing an European map are, China wasn’t placed in the center of the map, and the coastlines and aspect ratio for Southeast Asian islands are far more accurate than any contemporary Chinese maps.
The island labeled as 万老高 (Taigi: bān-láu-ko) is the Malaku islands, or the spice islands. At the time, the Sultan of the Ternate island made an alliance with the Dutch, and the Sultan of the Tidore island made an alliance with the Spansih. On the map, it is labeled as occupied by 紅毛 (Taigi: Âng-mn̂g), which is a Hokkien term reserved for the Dutch, and occupied by 化人 (Taigi: Huà-lâng).
I talked about 化人 being another way of transliterating 番人 Huan-lâng, which came from the Persian/Arab word farang, which meant Europeans, and ultimately came from the word Francs.
That detail pretty much dates the map, or at least the map this map was referencing. The Spanish established a foothold in the area in 1606, and the Dutch did so the following year. The Spanish were forced to pull back their troops from Tidore in 1662 when Koxinga threatened to invade Luzon.
Since the map also does not depict the Dutch occupying Batavia in 1619, and taking Taiwan between 1622 and 1624, it is most likely to have been made after 1610 but before 1619.
It also looks like 化人 version of transliterating Farang is reserved for the Spanish, and all other Farang are written as 番人, since on the very edge of the map, there’s an annotation that says 黃哇黎番 (Taigi: N̂g-gùa-lê Huan) and 呵难黎番 (Taigi: Ho-lân-lê Huan) live beyond this line.
Anyone wants to guess who 黃哇黎番 N̂g-gùa-lê Huan and 呵难黎番 Ho-lân-lê Huan refer to?
Dutch , and then maybe English for those two? First thought was Russians as that would be geographically more coherent, but Russia hadn’t manifest destinied the entirety of North Asia at that point and were probably even less known than the English/dutch to the Chinese.
They’re right that English and dutch are beyond that line… But like, quite a bit beyond it lol. You’d think they’d be pretty familiar with the contents of inner Asia. But I guess if it is indeed made by a Fujianese, naja… Inner Asia ranks comparatively low on the scale of relevance to their lives; probably more likely to see Brits and Spanish and Dutch than central Asians in the greater Indian Ocean-South China sea trade going on around there.
Either way, very cool map.
Presumably the little island here is Taiwan? with 北港 and 加里（a character made up of 本 and 木, no idea what that is). Shows how much they were interested in Taiwan in those times lol.
Which, btw, link here. Can view the map in pretty high definition:
Although to be fair, all Korea gets is a phallic shaped protuberance and a label of 朝鮮 
It’s amusing how certain levels of detail are given to areas you wouldn’t expect (I.e. the level of detail present in Vietnam) and then Korea just gets it’s name.
Which, I guess probably less trade down towards Fujian from Korea, or they’re just buying from downstream and not really selling much of interest? I’d figure what they have to sell is probably much the same as what is already present in China, so they just got the shrug, throw 朝鮮 on it. Good enough. Lol.
Cool map indeed.
One of the earliest names of Taiwan other than Formosa was Pacan (recorded by the Spanish) or Packan (recorded by the Dutch), which was written as 北港 in Hanji. For a while it was used to refer to the entire island.
Most people just write the second location as 加里林. There is debate on where it is. It might be a cognate to these places:
qali- is the Austronesian prefix for anything sacred or spirit-related.
I thought the same thing. 
I’m far too poorly versed in both Austronesian and Hokkien to really understand many of the threads you go on in detail about such things, but it’s fairly amazing. Consistently one of the most interesting posters here.
Hopefully one day I’ll have a hint of a clue about these things 
北撻在此
I’m guessing 撻 is an alternate way of writting 韃, which is from 韃子 and ultimately from 撻靼, which is the transliteration for the Tatars.
So most likely it’s referring to Mongolian khanates.
I think those two transliterations definitely point to the Chinese map making referencing a Portuguese or Spanish source right? The 黎 lê ending for the English and Hollander must had came from the -es ending in those two languages.
黃哇黎 N̂g-gùa-lê Inglês
呵难黎 Ho-lân-lê Holandês