Maps, History and Power is a course about the relationship between cartography, culture and control.  How did past societies and understand the world around them?  How did those societies use maps to represent physical, social and imaginative spaces?  Do maps merely reflect particular mentalities and social practices, or do they actively shape the experience and perception of the world? The course addresses these and other questions by exploring mapping practices and spatial thought in several European and non-European contexts from the medieval to the modern periods.  We will explore how past societies have used maps to serve a number of practical and ideological purposes:  to express religious belief, to aid navigation and commerce, to assert cultural superiority, and to enable state formation or imperial control. The course focuses on the period c.1300-c.1900.  It is truly global in coverage, and examples are drawn from Britain, France, the Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, the Ottoman Empire, Russia, China, India, Siam (Thailand), Latin America, the United States, Africa and others.