Newest Country: Coolest Country?

Yesterday, Greenland voted in favor of independence from Denmark. While the new status will not take effect until June 21, let us take a moment to welcome them to the family of nations. Also, we must acknowledge that they have one of the coolest flags!

Known as Kalaallit Nunaat in the local Inuit language, the new nation will be able to control the vast and lucrative untapped Arctic resources. With global warming, it may be easier to access petroleum products, as well as gold, rubies, uranium, aluminum, nickel, platinum, tungsten, titanium, and copper. Does this make Greenland the only nation that is in favor or global warming? Perhaps greater tourism is in their future. Greenland: the new Riviera of 2078?

Meanwhile, it's still pretty cold there. I would presume that Greenland is the coldest nation, north to south... someone will correct me if I am wrong.



UPDATE: OK, I stand corrected. They only voted for greater autonomy. It sounds like they will be able to act like a separate country in nearly every way...

Michigan's Superior Peninsula

In his book, Lost States: Real Quests for American Statehood (discussed earlier this week) Michael Trinklein discussed the proposed State of Superior. Composed of Michigan's Upper Peninsula and portions of Northern Wisconsin, this state would presumably give the attention this region deserves, but is not getting from Lansing or Madison.



While the proposal gained some traction among "Yoopers" in the 1960s and `70s, it never came to a formal vote. Although they do have their own flag:



Some residents of the U.P. have an inflated view of their region's importance (as seen in this postcard):



(See other inflated views)

Additional map postcards with views of pleasant peninsulas:







Speaking of the Keweenaw Peninsula... For those of us of a certain age, who grew up in or near Detroit, we remember TV Weatherman, Sonny Elliot, and his special recognition of the Keweenaw Peninsula... ("Right... spweeeeet!... here...") Watch this video just past the two minute mark:





As you can see, his very first weathermap of Michigan lopped off the Keweenaw, and he had to add it on... In later years he made sure his (higher-tech) weather maps always had a detachable Keweenaw. He was also famous for coining new weather terms: cloudy and cool = "clool"!

Sporcle: Can you name the most populous US cities?

Can you name the 25 most populous US cities?



Sporcle.com posts new trivia quizzes every day. Many of them are geography related. Today they posted a quiz on the 25 most populous cities in the United States. I am embarrased to say that I only scored 21 out of 25. Can you do better? No cheating by looking at the U.S. Census figures first...

Other map related Sporcle quizzes:

Countries of Europe
Countries of Asia
Most populous cities of the world
etc.

Plus, these were tougher than I thought they'd be:

U.S. State Flags
Flags of Europe

#260

Northern Antarctica

Another entry from Michael5000's Forgotten Lands:

Republic of Northern Antarctica

Capital: New Bristol
Population: 34,881 (1998)
Area: borders undefined
Independence: 1982
Economy: Based on tourism, supplemented by modest mineral exports and seasonal commercial fishing. Visiting scientific missions are a significant source of revenue. Heavily dependant on imports for manufactured goods and foodstuffs.
Per Capita Income: US$52,080
Literacy Rate: 100%

When Disraeli made his famous remark that "the Frenchman yearns for glory as the Northern Antarctican yearns for summer," he revealed as much about the latter nationality as the former. While the long, dark, and of course extremely cold winters make life on "the Underside" challenging, natives can look forward to the relatively mild summer, with its influx of tourists from all over the world and its frequent days of 24-hour sunshine.



Northern Antarctica has the unusual distinction of being the only country to span all 24 time zones – although a few of these are home only to two or three isolated settlers. Eighty-seven percent of Northern Antarcticans live in the country's four "cities" – of which the largest, Queen Maud, has a population of only 9400. None of the cities are connected to each other by road, due to the difficulty of building and maintaining highways in the harsh local environment. AntarticAir, the national airline, is the cities' primary connection to each other and to the outside world. It is the country's largest employer.

Few issues are more hotly debated among Northern Antarcticans than petroleum exploration. Exploiting Antarctic oil reserves would undoubtedly lead to much growth and economic development, but many fear that such rapid growth would destroy the existing Northern Antarctic way of life.

Flag: Three horizontal stripes of light blue, deep blue, and white. The design is pictographic, representing the typical view seen daily by the North Antarctican: ice in the foreground, the polar sea stretching to the horizon, and the pale Antarctic sky overhead.

National Anthem: "Land of Long Winters."

What Happened While I Was Gone?

Mrs. Cartophiliac and I are back from our trip to Mexico. We visited Mexico City and several nearby sites, Including Teotihuacan:



I found a handful of map postcards, but not much else in the way of map memorabilia. I'll post a few things in the next few days.

Normally, I like to keep tabs on the news, and of course most of the news I saw was in Spanish, so I wasn't always sure what was going on... however, clearly the two biggest news stories of the last two weeks have been the Olympics and the fighting in the former soviet republic of Georgia. Since returning home I have been doing some catching up... so some of these images may be old news for you...

The New York Times has this terrific Olympic cartogram, that compares the number of medals won per country, at every Olympic Games from 1896 to the present:



Via The Map Room

Also via The Map Room is this embarassing Google News map goof:



Jon Stewart of Comedy Central's The Daily Show makes light the average American's ignorance about World Geography:



"War. God's way of teaching Americans geography."



The Princess Sparkle Pony Blog was more than a little tired of the media's repeated allusion to the Ray Charles song, Georgia on My Mind.



FWIW

I do not find humor in the loss of life in this conflict between Georgia and Russia, but I cannot help but find ironic humor in the silly and ignorant responses to the tragedy.


#238

Iraq-Pakistan Border

On Good Morning America, while commenting on Barack Obama's Middle Eastern tour, John McCain made a bit of a geography "gaff":

"We have a lot of work to do. It’s a very hard struggle, particularly given the situation on the Iraq-Pakistan border."

While I will not likely be voting for McCain, it wouldn't be because of this silly little slip of the tongue. However, the satirical side of the vast left-wing media conspiracy is having a field day. I just enjoy the maps:

Countdown with Keith Olbmermann

Media Matters

CrooksandLiars.com

The Daily Show with Jon Stewart

Matthew Yglesias

Hip Hop is Read

In the interest of fairness, as soon as the vast right-wing media conspiracy mocks Barack Obama with maps, I'll be sure to cover it here.

UPDATE 7/23: Mr. RW Anon (see comments) is making me do all the work. OK, here we go:

I had forgotten about Obama's 57 states comment... in fact I vaguely recall an editorial cartoon that included a map... but I found this one from the Power Line Blog:



"Reader Porter Yates created the 57-state map above in honor of Obama's recent slip of the tongue. The map highlights all 18 states that voted for Kerry in 2004, all 31 states in Mexico, the 6 provinces in Canada that didn't vote conservative in 2006, Jamaica and Cuba (naturally)."

However, I think this new lapel pin is the funniest image to come out of that whole flap:


#224

Zagria

Michael5000 has created a handy index to his Forgotten Lands.

Zagria
Capital: Brevogrod
Population: 6,734,232 (1995 Census)
Area: 38,860 km2
Literacy Rate: 98%
Independence: 1672
Per Capita GNP: $12,030
National Anthem: “To Zagria we Pledge”

Economy: Zagria is an agricultural exporter, especially of grains, apples, grapes, and cheese. A coal/steel based heavy industrial sector suffers from aging and obsolete factories and facilities and from international competition. Oil fields underlying the southern plains of Svisla province provide Zagria’s most important source of foreign exchange.



Zagria is an anomaly in Eastern Europe. In this region of the Earth, as in no other, countries represent the territorial aspirations of cultures. The Poles have their Poland, the Slovaks their Slovakia, the Magyars their Hungary, and the half-dozen former Yugoslavs their half-dozen former Yugoslav republics. Yet within this mosaic of nation-states sits heterogeneous Zagria. Polyglot (Hungarian, Russian, Bulgarian, Romanian), religiously inclusive (Catholic, Orthodox, Islamic, and, surprisingly, Lutheran), Zagria is easily as culturally diverse as any other similarly sized piece of land on Earth.

For all of this, many observers find Zagrian society is disappointingly prosaic. Its many ethnic groups have neither walled themselves off into discrete enclaves, nor exhibited an unusual degree of mingling or intermarriage. There is little sense of animosity or contention between the people of this land, but neither is there any widespread sense of patriotism or national unity (Menillini, The New Nationalism).



Since independence, Zagria has gone through prime ministers at a rate of more than one per year, with parliamentary coalitions in constant flux and no political party able to maintain a stable majority. Post-communist economic stagnation and a widespread culture of corruption and bribery have created fertile grounds for a shadow oligarchy of ostentatious gangster-businessmen and their well-dressed thugs. To the average Zagrian of any culture, such things have long since ceased to excite much anger. “In Zagria,” wrote Brevograd’s great novelist Gnadyy Zvorić, “public life is as constant as weather, and as fruitfully cursed.”

Flag: Based on the shields of the medieval dukes of Zagria, the flag is a simple black diagonal through a field of dark green.

UPDATED 2008-08-28



#219

Forvik Update

Today is the Independence Day holiday in the United States. Last month, we learned of an announcement of the "independence" of the latest "micronation": the island of Forvik. We also see that they now have a flag.

However, not all is peaceful in the North Sea. Cartophilia has learned of a competing claim for sovereignty of the island.

The website, Forvik - Truth & Light, offers evidence of prior ownership, dating back to 1899. Below is a photograph of island and its inhabitants in 1938.


The decendants of that original owner now live on Cape Verde.

The Cape Verde military has mobilized for invasion!

Could be trouble.

Cartophilia and the BBC will keep you informed as the situation develops.


#211

New Bretton

[Another entry from Michael5000's Forgotten Lands with maps by Cartophiliac.]

New Bretton
Capital: Ipswich
Population: 12,493 (2001 Census)

Economy: Fish, Optical Equipment

When Newfoundland voted to join the Canadian Federation in 1949, the local vote on the fishing island of New Bretton was strongly against union. One week later, the island’s local government invoked an unusual provision in its original royal charter – dated 1678 – guaranteeing it the right to "dissociate from any colonie, or other lands of ye king, or any conjoining to these at will". Initially dismissed as an anachronism, the clause was ultimately found legally binding by the Newfoundland courts. New Bretton thus became one of the world’s smallest independent entities.



Although they rely on Great Britain for defense and representation in world bodies, New Brettons are a fiercely nationalistic people. “Never call a New Bretton a Canadian,” goes the local joke – “and the bigger he is, the more important that you don’t.” Though to the outsider there might seem to be little cultural distinction between New Bretton and the Atlantic provinces around it, to the natives there is much substance in small differences.

New Bretton is spared many of the Northwest Atlantic region’s economic woes due to the presence of New Bretton Scientific, a leading world manufacturer of precision optical equipment. Occupying a bluff overlooking the capital and only real town, the company’s production facility employs one of every five New Brettons, many in highly skilled and well-paid positions. Local entrepreneur Brian Redham founded the company in his basement in 1962, and is now thought to be comfortably among the world’s richest 100 people.

Flag: A red St. George’s cross is evidence of the English ancestry of most islanders. The white background of the English flag is replaced by blue, however, on New Bretton’s banner. No symbolism is attached to the blue; a typically pragmatic New Bretton once told the author that “they had to pick something besides white, else it would still be the flag of England.”

[Cartophiliac's Note:] While preparing to map this forgotten land, I discovered yet another interesting tidbit of information. It is commonly known that the nation of Canada is covered by six different time zones, ranging from Pacific (UTC-8) to Atlantic (UTC-4) and Newfoundland Standard (UTC-3:30). However, in typical New Brettonish style, the inhabitants have stubbornly refused to acknowledge the "standard time" of their neighbors, and instead insist upon the use of New Bretton Lunar Time (ranging from UTC-3:15 to UTC-3:45) based on a complicated system controlled in part by the phase of the moon. Many New Brettons, not employed by New Bretton Scientific, are engaged as public clock resetters. A daily task.


Congratulations to New Bretton for the distinction of being the 200th post on Cartophilia!

Gokura

[The next entry from Michael5000's Forgotten Lands with maps by Cartophiliac.]

Gokura
Capital: Gokura
Population: 542,486 (2000 census)

Economy: Shipping, finance, and light industry dominate an internationally oriented economy. Agricultural production is exclusively for local production. Gokura prints no money of its own; the local merchants and cashiers are willing and uncannily able to accept, calculate a rate for, and make change in virtually any significant world currency.



If the impossibly rugged and remote island of New Guinea is to a certain extent a world of its own, then this prosperous little country occupying the lower valley of the Five Bats River is the least typical part of that world. Where Papua New Guinea is one of the least technologically developed countries on Earth, Gokura is a gleaming oasis of modernity. Where Papua New Guinea is loosely governed by a weak central government, in Gokura the state is deeply involved in the lives of its citizens. Papua New Guinea is overwhelmingly Christian and largely off the beaten track; Gokura is Muslim and, at nearly the eastern tip of the island, sits on a natural bottleneck for oceangoing traffic.



Gokura, converted by traders in missionaries in the 13th Century, represents the easternmost spread of traditional Islam. Held by the Portuguese during the colonial era, it was incorporated into Japan’s military empire in the 1930s, gaining independence after liberation by Australian troops during the Second World War. Though much smaller and of a lower profile than other Asian city-states, it has developed a similar prosperity over the last half-century through success in shipping, manufacturing, financial services, and technology. A rare high-profile moment was a 1998 cover story on “Asia’s Other Tiger” in the business magazine The Economist.

Gokura is a self-avowed Islamic state. Non-observance is tacitly tolerated, but public practice of faiths other than Islam is strictly prohibited. The city and its surrounding farms convey an impression of immaculate order, tidiness, and cleanliness. The government ascribes the extremely low crime rate to a faith-based public education system and strict enforcement of traditional Islamic law.

Flag: Intersecting green diagonals, trimmed with gold on official banners (but not on the less expensive flags seen on many schools and public buildings), against a black background. No official account of the flag’s design is known, but the green is assumed to have been chosen to represent Islam.

Nova Hibernia

Another of Michael5000's Forgotten Lands with maps by Cartophiliac.

Nova Hibernia
Capital: N'koutou (formerly St. Patrick, Karlsburg)
Population: 1,443,000 (2000 estimate)

Economy: Produces cashews, cotton, sugar, citrus, timber, and fish. Imports include machinery and equipment, metals, staple foodstuffs, and textiles. Subsistence agricultural is practiced by a significant portion of the population.

The country of Nova Hibernia came into being in 1882 as the colony of German Central Africa. Like most other territories that were created by the Treaty of Berlin, German Central Africa contained a heterogeneous population drawn from disparate peoples who shared no common language, culture, or history. The Germans established a port at Karlsberg, but in their 30 years of rule did not manage to extend practical authority past its hinterlands. Stripped from Germany along with its other colonial possessions after World War I, the now nameless colony existed for several years as a League of Nations Protectorate. After several years of the British and French blocking each other's moves to absorb the little territory, administration was finally handed over in 1924 as something of a gift to the fledgling Irish Free State.



Absorbed in their own lengthy struggle for full independence, the Irish devoted little attention to their "overseas empire." As a result, the Irish administration had an even lighter footstep than had the German. Although adopting some Western innovations, most inhabitants of the newly-renamed Nova Hibernia tended to continue to live and govern themselves according to well-established indigenous systems. When a provisional government set up by native schoolteacher Brian Ktombe petitioned for and was granted independence by the Irish Parliament in 1963, the event failed to make the front page of the Irish Times.

Since independence, Nova Hibernia has suffered two periods of military rule, once for three months in 1969 and again from 1978 to 1984. Ktombe's nephew, Brian Ktombe III, became president in 1985 in elections that restored democratic rule. Since that time, he has been re-elected every six years in elections that, by the standards of sub-Saharan Africa, have been relatively free and fairly contested.
Nova Hibernia is also unusual in Africa in that it never acquired a large international debt. Instead, the country's political elite have long pursued a policy of small-scale local development and grassroots education. Perhaps not coincidentally, Nova Hibernia enters the third millennium with one of the continent's highest standards of living.

Flag: Older colonial banners, like the capital city's name, were replaced at independence. The new design was clearly inspired by the flag of the United States, the country on which Nova Hibernia's federal system was modeled. The ten colored stripes represent the ten federal districts, and the blue field represents the common blood* of all Nova Hibernia's people. Some have speculated that the lack of green, orange, or white in the flag suggests a rejection of all things Irish by the newly independant colony.

*In local tradition, blue is the color of "living blood" (as it is seen in the vein). Red represents "dead blood," and is generally avoided in decoration.

Kim'chin do

Michael5000, one of my favorite bloggers, recently engaged in a creative project called Geography of the Forgotten Lands. I already knew he was interested in flag design, but it turns out he also likes to create imaginary countries! Michael has created descriptions, and flags of countries that are "part parody of reference-book prose, part commentary on world events, part pure geographical fantasy." I just think they are good fun.

The one piece missing from these delightful geographical fantasies are maps. So, from time to time I plan to draw map of these imaginary countries. Unfortunately, I am not very artistic, so if one of you artistically inclined cartophiles out there would like to draw a map with more detail (mountains, rivers, more cities, etc.) send them to me and I will be pleased to post them.


Kim’chin do
Capital: Namju
Population: 161,000 (2001 estimate)

Economy: Fishing, forestry, zinc, electronic goods.

If you look at the area northeast of Hokkaido on any world map, chances are you will see only open ocean. It is not entirely clear how an island as large as Kim'chindo came to be forgotten by the world's cartographers. As the site of major Soviet naval and air bases, it was regularly omitted from that country's maps for security purposes. While it is difficult to imagine the Western publishing companies taking their cue from the USSR, no other explanation has ever been put forward for the island nation's widespread omission from our maps and atlases.



The natives of Kim'chindo had tales of their ancestors arriving from the south on a city of rafts. Modern archaeologists have established only that a large migration arrived from the Korean penninsula, in the 12th Century A.D. A great capital of wood buildings was built on the southern tip of the island on a sophisticated plan of broad boulevards and great open plazas. This city, Kim'sol, was destroyed by a tidal wave in around 1620:

My city
floats out to sea
in jumbled sticks.
-- Ko Tae-Li, 17th Century

As much as half the island's population perished in the disaster.

In the modern era, the island was handed from empire to empire: the British (1710) were followed by the Dutch (1770), the Japanese (1906), and the Soviets (1945). Kim'chindo stumbled into independence after the breakup of the USSR with a small but polyglot population (34% Japanese, 32% Kim'chin Korean, 12% Russian, 12% Chinese, 10% European) and no tradition of self-government. A parliamentary system has been established and elections held, but the real power in Kim'chindo is held by the large corporations (mostly Japanese and Dutch) that have acquired its mills, mines, and factories. Nearly 40% of working citizens, a 2002 study found, are in the employ of a foreign corporation. Wages and investment in national infrastructure remain well below world averages.

Flag: The Kim'chin, like many Asian cultures, associated colors with direction. The modern flag, designed in 1993, is thus a sort of traditional map. Red, in the center, represents the people. Black is to the north, white to the south, yellow is to the west, and green to the east. Blue and purple were considered the colors of danger in classical Kim'chinsymbology, and are rarely seen in traditional decoration.

Kim'chin do description and flag by Michael5000.

Oregon: the Quilter State

In addition to the Kentucky Democratic Primary tomorrow, folks will also be voting in Oregon. Barack Obama is expected to win this primary.

Oregon is one of the handful of states I have never visited, so I only have these two map postcards:



The only resident of Oregon that I sort of "know" is blogger, Michael5000; art quilter, bible-reader, and pop quizzer. He loves his home state, and his home town of Portland (City of Roses). However, unhappy with his state's boring flag, he sponsored a contest to design a new flag. The winner:

Meet the World

This blog is about maps, not flags... but since I have digressed in that direction in the past, I will share this clever work.

The flags campaign, "Meet the World", is the work of Icaro Doria, a Brazilian working for the "hard journalism" magazine, Grande Reportagem, in Lisbon, Portugal. Two examples:





View the rest here

Icaro Doria said:

This is how we thought of the concept Meet the World.

We started to research relevant, global, and current facts and, thus, came up with the idea to put new meanings to the colours of the flags. We used real data taken from the websites of Amnesty International and the UNO.

An "A" for Quastolia

Earlier this year, I shared some maps from my "imaginary country", Quastolia. In addition, I re-created the flag of Quastolia, that has become my unofficial logo:

The other day, while browsing through my collection of Quastolian artifacts, I came across a school project about Quastolia! I remember this. It must have been my ninth-grade English class. I don't know what the assignment was... I'm sure the assignment was NOT to create an imaginary country, but my teacher OK'd a report about Quastolia for credit. I turned in a 19-page document that included:

• maps (of course)
• government structure
• voting process done online by computer (in 1975!)
• courts and judicial system
• military structure
• population
• monetary system
• major religions

The cover of the report was decorated with this flag:



What an archaeological find! I had forgotten that this was the original flag of Quastolia. The flag with the eight-pointed Star of Quas came later, after the royal restoration. Note the Tolkienesque alphabet used in the lettering at the three points of the triangle. They were the characters in our language for "A", "C" and "Q", for Aqceyquas... the land founded by Aq, Ceygol and Quas.

Needless to say, my teacher was impressed. She gave me an "A", with these comments:

What can I say! After 16 years of teaching, this is the first time I have ever read anything so creative and different. You gave it considerable thought. Would like you to explain this to class.

Scribbled below her comments was my answer: "No way!"

For someone who had tought school for 16 years, she showed very little understanding of adolescents. If I were to stand up in front of my class and explain to them all about the imaginary country in my back yard, populated by ants, I would be guaranteed to get my ass kicked outside the building after school...

Kosovo Independence - New Flag

Kosovo unilaterally declared independence on February 17. At the same time they unveiled their new offical flag: a gold map of Kosovo on a blue field beneath six white stars.

According to The Balkan Travellers, the new flag is "reminiscent of the European flag... The colours are said to represent Kosovo’s aspirations towards Europe and the EU, while the stars symbolise the ethnic communities that inhabit the province – the Albanian majority and the five minorities: Roma Egyptians and Ashkali, collectively known as RAE; Bosniak; Gorani; Turk; and the largest one – the Serbs."

Good luck to the Kosovars and their new country, however, when it comes to flag design, they may already be off to a bad start, as they have violated Rule 2 of Josh Parson's Rules of Flag Design, "Do not put a map of your country on your flag".

South Carolina

South Carolina has experienced its 30 minutes of electoral fame for this election cycle. Fifteen for the Republican Primary last week, and fifteen more for the Democratic Primary yesterday.

Our friends at The Electoral Map have gathered some geographical analysis of the Republican Primary (and more here) as well as the Democratic Primary.

However, the map image that really caught my eye was this analysis of Barbecue Regions. Mmmm, Barbecue... (must be lunchtime...)

• The State of South Carolina is known as the "Palmetto State".
  
• The Battle of Kings Mountain marked a turning point the the Southern Theatre of the American Revolution.
  
• It was the first state to secede from the Union in 1860 and the American Civil War began when Confederate batteries began shelling Fort Sumter in Charleston Harbor.
  
• The state's stubborn worship of the Confederate battle flag still causes controversies and boycotts.
  
• However, the official state flag is a fine design. No boring "Official Seal", although the palmetto tree may violate Josh Parson's Rule #2a of Flag Design (Do not put a picture of anything on your flag).
  
• Your fearless cartographic correspondent has many ancestors from South Carolina, and still has many cousins living in the Piedmont, or Tomato Barbecue Region.

Here is a map postcard of South Carolina from my collection:

Quastolia - The Early Years

I promised Tony, the creator of Alphistia, that I would post some maps from my "geofictional project", Quastolia:

I have loved maps for as long as I can remember. I'm pretty sure that the first map I drew of my neighborhood was in an attempt to chart the most efficient path for Trick-or-Treat on Halloween. I had often pretended that imaginary kingdoms existed right outside my door...

However, it wasn't until Junior High School, when I overheard my friends John and Bill discussing "Ceygolia" and "Aqua Region". I was able to pry out of them that these were the names of their "ant countries." These were countries in their back yard, and the tiny insects were their citizens. They had already begun drawing maps and developing their "ant country" economies. I wanted in. By the next time I saw them, I had already devised a name for my country, drawn my first map, and designed a flag.

The flag of what was first called "Outer Quastolia" appears to have violated Rule #2 of Josh Parson's Rules of Flag design (Do not put a picture of anything on your flag, especially weapons!). However, I have always been rather proud of it this design.

In the beginning, the Kingdom of Outer Quastolia was ruled by a usurper wizard, but King James was soon restored and Outer and Inner Quastolia were reunited. Here you see a map of Quastolia. At the time it consisted of my yard. The house was the capital. By the time this map was drawn, several of the neighbors homes had also been incorporated into the kingdom. General Tip, our black Labrador Retriever, was the Minister of Defense. Peace and glory were restored.



Bill Williams had already created the Kingdom of Ceygolia.



You can see that we were both heavily influenced the J.R.R. Tolkien's Lord of the Rings, and played many games with spelling our friends (and enemies) names backwards to create place names in our world.



Bill and I went on to create extensive histories, flags and maps for neighboring countries were designed, and whenever Quastolia or Ceygolia needed to go to war, we just went out and stomped a few ant hills.

Eventually, we broadened the scope of our "ant countries".

Story continued:
Quastolia - The Middle Years

Alphistia

Several weeks ago, I wrote about the Lonely Planet Micronations book and promised to write more about other micronations, sometimes referred to as cybernations, fantasy countries, model countries, and new country or geofictional projects.

Our first stop on this journey is Project Alphistia. Alphistia was founded in 1967 by Tony. It began as a "backyard nation" on Putnam street, then grew into a virtual world.



Alphistia today has grown in detail to include a complex geography, history, goverment, economy and language all its own. Above is a map of the nation, below is its capital, Enteve.

Maps on Flags

Josh Parsons is not happy with the poor design of some of the world's nation flags. "Some are good, some are bad. Some countries have clearly taken care in the choice of colours, layout, and design. Others have been lazy, stolen the flags of their neighbours, or just designed flags that are clearly supposed to cause pain to those who look at them." Rather than stew in silence, he did something about it. He ranked all of the flags of the world and gave them a score based on their overall aesthetic value.

In his Flags of the World Given Letter Grades he give high marks for simple design with a pleasant choice of colors. Ugly flags, with garish colors are sent to the corner with a dunce cap.

What does any of this have to do with maps? Parson's Rule 2: Do not put a map of your country on your flag. "When someone is travelling around your country, where do you think they will look if they need a map? Bzzt! No, they won't look at the flag." The worst offender is Cyprus. "Quite apart from the total uselessness of having a map on your flag, it really shows that a country hasn't gone to any effort if that's the best they can think of." While Cyprus has a distinctive shape, so do many other countries... but they can do better. Flags should be iconic, not literal. Grade D

He gives kudos to the nation of Gambia. "Great design and colour choice. Also represents the geography of the country (without being a map)." Grade A+

Gambia is a tiny nation hugging either side of the Gambia River, but surrouned by the nation of Senegal. The map design suggests this, without being too obvious. Clever map design.

Thanks to Gadling for bringing this to my attention, here and here. In addition, they pointed me to this interesting flag related site, Flags by Colours.