Survey Department Motor Map of Ceylon

Survey Department Motor Map of Ceylon. by Ceylon Survey Department; Maddams, William Samuel (1877 - 1958) "This large and attractive map embraces all of Ceylon (Sri Lanka) and carefully delineates its entire transportation network. The island’s topography is precisely expressed based upon the latest official surveys, with elevations shown by altitude tints. The legend, in the upper right, explains the symbols used to identify major motor roads, other motor roads, paths, ferries, railways, petrol stations, rest houses, hotels and telephone boxes; to either side are pictorial representations of ‘Standard Motor Traffic Signs’. The text registers to the left-hand side of the composition list the locations of petrol depots, police stations with telegraph offices, rest houses and hotels, hospitals and pharmacies, circuit bungalows (rest houses for civil servants), railway stations with automobile rental offices, and climate data for many locations. Of particular interest, the map features insets of the street plans of 22 of Ceylon’s most important cities and towns.

In sum, the map provides everything one needs to know about touring Ceylon during what were still relatively early days of the automotive era. The map was compiled by William Samuel Maddams (1877 - 1958), then Ceylon’s Assistant Superintendent of Surveys, an experienced cartographer who first learned surveying and draftsmanship while fighting in East Africa during World War I. He subsequently spent many years engaged by the Ceylon Survey Department in Columbo, where he drafted many of the era’s most important maps of the island. The present map is part of sequence of Motor Maps of Ceylon, issued by the Survey Department in regularly updated editions from 1918 to 1973.

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