Obliterating historical complexity as academic practice: historiographical maps of 7th c. BCE Egypt

The contribution focuses on the interdependence between map production and map usage including adaption and re-circulation, which can be witnessed by a historiographical approach to mapping. Case study are the maps displaying the history of 7th c. BCE Egypt, which date from the later 20th and early 21st c. AD . Key observation is the loss of specialised cartographic and even historiographical knowledge in the process of its dissemination. Though the case study presents a very specific example and, in addition, one that is based on a rather small corpus of sources, the author assumes that the detectable mechanisms are in operation on a much larger scale, though maybe less visible.