特别广播英语第 73 课：Why Are Maps Drawn with North at the Top?
为什么把地图画成北方朝上？-1

Now it is hard to visualize a map that does not feature north at the top, but this was not always so. 现在很难设想，若绘制地图不以北方作为地图的上方。可是过去可并不总是这样绘制的。

The oldest known map in the accepted sense of the word was drawn about 3,800 BC, and represents the river Euphrates flowing through northern Mesopotamia, Iraq. 现在已知的被公认为世上最古老的地图绘制于公元前3800年，这幅地图描绘的是流经伊拉克北部的美索不达米亚平原的幼发拉底河。

This, and others that followed it, were little more than rough sketches of localized features; 这张地图，以及从这以后绘制的一些地图，最多也只不过算做是一些局部地区的很粗略的一些草图而已；

it was not until many centuries later that the ancient Greeks placed the science of map-making on a sound footing. 直到很多世纪以后，古希腊人才把绘制地图这门科学置于坚实合理的基础之上。

At the fore front of the pioneers in the field was the Greek mathematician and philosopher Claudius Ptolemaeus (c. AD 90~168), more popularly known to history as Ptolemy. 在绘制地图这一专业先驱者当中，处于最前列最古的地位的就是古希腊的数学家兼哲学家克劳迪o托勒密尤斯，即历史上广为人知的托勒密。

The last great scientist of the classical period, he was the first to draw a map that was based on all available knowledge, rather than guess or imagination. 他，作为古典时期的最后一位伟大的科学家，以当时的知识水平为基础，而不是凭猜测或想象，是绘制出地图的第一个人。

Earlier, the Babylonians had attempted to map the world, but they presented it in the form of a flattened disc rather than a sphere, which was the form adopted by Ptolemy. 在这以前更早的时候，巴比伦人曾经企图绘制世界地图，但是巴比伦人绘制成一个扁平的圆盘形，而不是绘制像托勒密所绘制的球形。

Given the state of knowledge of those times, he got things wrong; for example, his estimate of China and the Atlantic Ocean was far from being accurate. 由于那个时代的知识水平有限，所以他把一些情况搞错了，例如：他对中国和大西洋的看法，远远不够精确。

Nevertheless, it was a useful effort, and the map remained a word of reference for over a thousand years. 尽管如此，他努力绘制的地图还是很有用处的。他所绘制的地图在从那时起的一千多年的时间内仍不失为一份重要参考资料。

In fact, Christopher Columbus used a version of it when he set sail in search of the New World - which caused him some navigational problems, 事实上，克里斯托佛o哥伦布在扬帆前去寻找新世界的时候，所用过的就正是托勒密所绘制的地图版本--这就是造成了哥伦布在航海中产生了一些问题的那个版本。