Talk:John Rocque's maps of London

A fact from John Rocque's maps of London appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page in the Did you know column on 5 July 2013 (check views). The text of the entry was as follows:

Did you know... that John Rocque's Map of London, 1746, has been considered "one of the greatest and most handsome plans of any city"?

A record of the entry may be seen at Wikipedia:Recent additions/2013/July. The nomination discussion and review may be seen at Template:Did you know nominations/John Rocque's Map of London, 1746.

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Museum of London

This fine article doesn't seem to need much help but, when I was in the Museum of London recently for the Lord Mayor's Gresham lecture, I noticed that their shop had lots of good material about this and other maps of London, such as the CD of the map produced by MotCo. I had to restrain myself but still came away with two more books for my library. Warden (talk) 08:56, 25 June 2013 (UTC)[reply]

As a young child I used to get taken to the London Museum, sixty years ago. I loved the diorama of the Great Fire of London with all the old-fashioned streets and houses and the flames flickering in the windows. But the Science Museum was better. The children's section had a door that automatically opened when you went near it. It was the best exhibit so there were queues of kids. Thincat (talk) 16:28, 26 June 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Lead image

I don't want to jog Thincat's elbow but I itch to add a lead image. I liked the stitched image of the earlier edition and so something similar would be good:

Alternatively, a crop of the bottom centre, around the shield which bears the title might work, somewhat like a book cover.

And, of course, we need an image of the man himself.

Warden (talk) 09:07, 25 June 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I would like to echo this plea for a good lead image, although I would have thought that what was wanted was a cropped detail reproduced at sufficiently large a scale for the newcomer to get a sense of the depth of detail within the map – something like this. The choice, however, should clearly be Thincat's. GrindtXX (talk) 19:24, 25 June 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I had also been wanting a lead image and have at last created one. I have only just come to this talk page to see great minds thinking alike. I think I have substantially finished now so please edit away as you like. I have been avoiding MOTCO images because I guess their work may well be copyright in the UK and I happen to feel rather sympathetic to them. There is no doubt this is to the article's disadvantage. I may well try emailing whoever when the article is settled since they might well think a graphically improved article is to their benefit. I see MOTCO being responsive to some webmasters asking permission. Thincat (talk) 15:16, 26 June 2013 (UTC)[reply]

As for an image of Rocque himself, I wonder if there is anything. This is strange because he became quite famous and towards the end of his life hob-nobbed with royalty. This playfully wonders whether Rocque produced a self-portrait and the lead image here was obviously done with feeling! Thincat (talk) 16:17, 26 June 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I have emailed MOTCO. Thincat (talk) 18:47, 26 June 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Noting good MOTCO images

D2,3 St Paul's; E2,3 - F2,1 - E2,6 Seething Lane Pepys second house and the Navy Office

F2,4 Tower of London and charming ships on the River; C2,7 - C3,1 Parliament, etc.

B1,2 - B1,5 rural Tottenham Court Road; B2,7 - B2,8 Buckingham House and St James Palace

E2,2 Royal Exchange as GrindtXX suggests though I'd go more to the north slightly

C2,8 - C2,9 Market gardening, timber yards. London Eye these days Thincat (talk) 20:53, 26 June 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I have a reply from MOTCO, but I'm not finding it too encouraging. Thincat (talk) 20:54, 30 June 2013 (UTC)[reply]

That's a shame. However, they can clearly only claim copyright in their particular scans of the map, not in all images of it. Several images already on Commons at Maps by John Rocque appear to come from different sources. As for the particular choice, my own preference would be to avoid the rural fringes but rather to show the densely settled urban centre, and to include at least one large building with a distinctive ground plan. Several of your suggestions meet those criteria, though really I think the Tower of London and ships – perhaps cropped rather more tightly than the full sheet image below – would be a good start. GrindtXX (talk) 00:21, 1 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, I'm sure you are right. The person replying asked who I was and what my objectives were so perhaps they didn't know about Wikipedia or its way of working. Anyway, I've replied briefly and as best I can (saying I'm not anybody!). I have scrutinised the images being displayed and I'm as sure as I can be they come from a different original and are not merely low-resolution copies. Thincat (talk) 05:00, 1 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Ten Miles Round

I have just added the other 1746 Map of London by M. Rocque. The current title encapsulates both maps, as it is not specific enough to refer to one or the other. Algarve1233 (talk) 08:03, 27 April 2015 (UTC)[reply]

High resolution images

The Library of Congress has put online some high quality, high resolution images of the map. At https://www.loc.gov/item/76696823/ at the time of downloading there were included in files available a JPEG 6048x3164 now uploaded to File:John Rocque's map of London and Westminster, 1746 low res.jpg and now displayed at the top of this article; and a JPEG 2000. The JPEG 2000 was 48387x25318, 24 bit, which I downloaded (299 MB). I converted this to jpg with Irfan64 and used GIMP to crop out 24 xcf images, then exported as png and jpg, one for each sheet, always with least compression. These are typically about 5800x8000. They have been uploaded as File:John Rocque 1746 1a.png to File:John Rocque 1746 3h.png (and .jpg) and the jpegs are displayed near the foot of this article. Thincat (talk) 09:31, 26 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Title

The title of this article should be changed to John Rocque's Maps of London

The present article covers two completely different maps, both published in 1746:

The famous 24-sheet, 26" : mile A plan of the cities of London and Westminster, and borough of Southwark, with the contiguous buildings.
The lesser known 16-sheet, lower-scale An exact survey of the city's of London and Westminster, ye borough of Southwark and the country near ten miles round : begun in 1741, finished in 1745, and published in 1746, according to act of Parliament / by John Rocque ; engrav'd by Richard Parr and printed by W. Pratt.

Strictly speaking, neither of these is a map of "London", whether in the modern sense of Greater London, or as it would have been understood in Rocque's day, when it meant the City of London — the Square Mile — and nothing else. The first map, for example, does not cover the Isle of Dogs.

Besides these two, Rocque had other maps of London of different dates.

Alternatively, if it is desired to restrict the article to Rocque's famous 26" : mile map, the other material should be removed, though I do not favour that myself. Ttocserp 00:16, 14 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]