John Cary was an English cartographer.
The Ramsden surveying instruments are those constructed by Jesse Ramsden and used in high precision geodetic surveys carried out in the period 1784 to 1853. This includes the five great theodolites—great in name, great in size and great in accuracy—used in surveys of Britain and other parts of the world. Ramsden also provided the equipment used in the measurement of the many base lines of these surveys and also the zenith telescope used in latitude determinations.
The Principal Triangulation of Britain was the first high-precision triangulation survey of the whole of Great Britain and Ireland, carried out between 1791 and 1853 under the auspices of the Board of Ordnance. The aim of the survey was to establish precise geographical coordinates of almost 300 significant landmarks which could be used as the fixed points of local topographic surveys from which maps could be drawn. In addition there was a purely scientific aim in providing precise data for geodetic calculations such as the determination of the length of meridian arcs and the figure of the Earth. Such a survey had been proposed by William Roy (1726–1790) on his completion of the Anglo-French Survey but it was only after his death that the Board of Ordnance initiated the trigonometric survey, motivated by military considerations in a time of a threatened French invasion. Most of the work was carried out under the direction of Isaac Dalby, William Mudge and Thomas Frederick Colby, but the final synthesis and report (1858) was the work of Alexander Ross Clarke. The survey stood the test of time for a century, until the Retriangulation of Great Britain between 1935 and 1962.
John Adair FRS (1660–1718) was a Scottish surveyor and cartographer, noted for the excellence of his maps.
Ordnance Survey Ireland was the national mapping agency of Ireland. It was established on 4 March 2002 as a body corporate. It was the successor to the former Ordnance Survey of Ireland. It and the Ordnance Survey of Northern Ireland (OSNI) were themselves the successors to the Irish operations of the British Ordnance Survey. OSI was part of the Irish public service. OSI was headquartered at Mountjoy House in the Phoenix Park in Dublin, which had previously been the headquarters of the British Ordnance Survey in Ireland until 1922.
John Rocque was a French-born British surveyor and cartographer, best known for his detailed map of London published in 1746.
Aaron Arrowsmith (1750–1823) was an English cartographer, engraver and publisher and founding member of the Arrowsmith family of geographers.
The Great Trigonometrical Survey was a project that aimed to survey the entire Indian subcontinent with scientific precision. It was begun in 1802 by the British infantry officer William Lambton, under the auspices of the East India Company. Under the leadership of his successor, George Everest, the project was made the responsibility of the Survey of India. Everest was succeeded by Andrew Scott Waugh, and after 1861, the project was led by James Walker, who oversaw its completion in 1871.
Thomas Frederick Colby FRS FRSE FGS FRGS, was a British major-general and director of the Ordnance Survey (OS). A Fellow of the Royal Astronomical Society and Royal Society, Colby was one of the leading geographers of his time.
William Yolland CB, FRS FRSA was an English military surveyor, astronomer and engineer, and was Britain's Chief Inspector of Railways from 1877 until his death. He was a redoubtable campaigner for railway safety, often in the face of strong opposition, at a time when railway investment was being directed towards the expansion of the networks rather than the prevention of accidents. He was a member of the three-man committee of inquiry into the Tay Bridge disaster.
John Arrowsmith (1790–1873) was an English cartographer. He was born at Winston, County Durham, England. He was the nephew of Aaron Arrowsmith, another English cartographer.
Sidney Hall (1788?–1831) was a British engraver and cartographer well known and popular for his early nineteenth century atlases containing maps of the United Kingdom and of the ancient world reproduced from Hall's engravings. Hall made engravings for a number of international atlases at a time when cartography and atlases were very popular. He also engraved a series of cards for the various constellations, published c.1825 in a boxed set called Urania's Mirror.
The Ordnance Survey (OS) is the national mapping agency for Great Britain. The agency's name indicates its original military purpose, which was to map Scotland in the wake of the Jacobite rising of 1745. There was also a more general and nationwide need in light of the potential threat of invasion during the Napoleonic Wars. Since 1 April 2015, the Ordnance Survey has operated as Ordnance Survey Ltd, a government-owned company, 100% in public ownership. The Ordnance Survey Board remains accountable to the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology. It was also a member of the Public Data Group.
Colonel Robert Kearsley Dawson was an English surveyor and cartographer of the Corps of Royal Engineers.
William Mudge (1762–1820) was an English artillery officer and surveyor, born in Plymouth, an important figure in the work of the Ordnance Survey.
Christopher (1786–1855) and John Greenwood were brother cartographers who produced large-scale maps of England and Wales in the 1820s. Their partnership began in 1821, using the imprint "C.&J.Greenwood".
Dunnose is a cape on the Isle of Wight in the English Channel. The headland is visible from well out to sea, and is used in navigation. It has twice been used as the base point for a triangulation of Great Britain. The line of accurately surveyed points running north from Dunnose to Clifton in Yorkshire provide the basis for triangulation to determine the positions of all other locations in Britain.
John Rocque's Map of London, Westminster, and Southwark, 1746 can refer to two different maps. The better known of these has the full name A plan of the cities of London and Westminster, and borough of Southwark: it is a map of Georgian London to a scale of 26 inches to a mile, surveyed by John Rocque, engraved by John Pine, and published in 1746. It consists of 24 sheets and measures 3.84 by 2.01 metres. Taking nearly ten years to survey, engrave and publish, it has been described as "a magnificent example of cartography ... one of the greatest and most handsome plans of any city".
