1900 Harris Map of Southern Africa

This is a c. 1900 William Cornwallis Harris map of southeastern Africa. The map depicts the region from Graaff Reinet to Delagoa Bay and from the Kalahari Desert to Graaf Reinet. Originally published in Harris's book The Wild Sports of Southern Africa, the map traces the route Harris followed during his 1837 - 1838 hunting trip in the area using a line highlighted in blue. The green line follows the peregrinations of David Hume, a Scottish explorer and big game hunter. Noteworthy for its level of detail, Harris references numerous tribes by name, making it abundantly clear that the territory was not 'deserted' as some would have had you believe at the time of this map's original publication. Harris's geography also is not perfect, but he created this piece by basing it on a map published by Arrowsmith in 1834 and then adding, as Norman Etherington puts it, 'many details obtained during his travels in the interior'.

Publication History and Census

This map was created by William Cornwallis Harris to for publication in his book entitled The Wild Sports of Southern Africa, which was first published in 1838. Many subsequent editions have been published, and we believe this example to come from an edition that was published c. 1900 because of the combination of the printing technique and the paper.