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Spoiler Maps! Based on the GPC and Others


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So, I'm attaching a map here, it's based on Abraham Ortellius' 16th century map of Europe. Some of the icons come from an Ortrllius map of Belgium. And others come from a few versions of the Cambriae Typus. 

Cities and locations come from the Pendragon main book map, the GPC, and some historical and current research into land use and ancient city placement. I tried to keep additions to a minimum, but Scotland was just a little too barren.

Some notes, it's scaled to either 24x36 or 36x48 inches. Let me know if you have any suggestions or improvements. The only thing that will likely be done by me at this point is a look for a usable historical scale bar to duplicate. The year of the map is, 502 I believe. It may be for 503. If anyone else has some maps they'd like to share, I'd like to see them. I'll share the other maps I've made in another post.

The maps are all made in ArcGIS Pro. The original data comes from either open source data, created by me, or from the Pendragon line.

Links:

Europe-https://commons.m.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Abraham_Ortelius_Map_of_Europe.jpg

Belgium-https://commons.m.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ortelius_Belgii_Veteris_(1594).jpg

 

Edit: Maps have been added/updated. The Salisbury has the Castle Navaronne on it which is because my players have built a castle there for their order of knights they've established. 

Edit: European Political Map added for the Roman Eat, the color schemes show relationship of cultures or political relationships. All that is green recognizes Arthur.

Edit: Updated the maps and uploaded more counties. All of the old maps have been replaced. Add new county style maps, but left the old ones. New maps are inspired by 1805 English County maps.

Edit: A romance-tournament map is complete. It's accurate to what we know, but I imagine there will be major differences per GM in Ireland and France. Same style as the older ones political maps. Fixed 519 it was real messed up. And did a quick early boy king labeled 513. It's not perfect, but fills the missing gap.

Edit: Added a Cambrian regional map from the Anarchy or earlier.

Europe Political Map.pdf

Salisbury County Map.pdf Britain Regional Compressed.pdf Ascalon County Map.pdf Jagent County Map.pdf Britain Political Compressed 502.pdf Europe Political Map.pdf Dorset County Map.pdf Rydychan County Map.pdf

Salisbury County Map 1805 style Manors Red.pdf Salisbury 1805 Style Compressed (Roderick).pdf

 

Britain Political Map 544 (official).pdf Britain Political 519 Compressed.pdf Britain Political 513 Compressed.pdf

Cambria Map 500 Compressed.pdf

Edited by Username
New map! Revive my forum topic Bwahaha. Sorry, it seemed like a waste to make a new one.
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It looks nice. I noticed you have given each power its own land. so all the lands of Escavalon are together. But in that case you should divide Logres as well. There is no king and there are some strong lords: Duke Lindsey in the north and Duke Silchester in the south. The map of 495 gives the strongest political parties at that moment, although other powers have shifted the ones in Logres do not. So they are not unified front. In fact in 503 according to the GPC Malahaut and Escavalon fight over the spoils (being Duke Lindsey).

Also Kent and Essex join together to take London.

Not sure if Garloth is part of Lothian. The maps in the GPC say so, and  the text says King Nentres is King Lot's right hand man. But 512 Nentres is present at the battle at the the Bassus river (and killed there) as an ally of Malahaut, but Lot is apparantly not present. He could be there on his liege's orders, but I am not sure.

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On 8/8/2019 at 10:01 PM, jeffjerwin said:

Cambenet is essentially part of Malohaut; it includes the valley of the Eden or what is now eastern Cumbria.

I left Cambenet out because it seems to be wilderness in the GPC. Though, perhaps that was a mistake. Do you know where I could find a map or anything to readjust the borders accordingly?

On 8/9/2019 at 8:26 AM, Cornelius said:

It looks nice. I noticed you have given each power its own land. so all the lands of Escavalon are together. But in that case you should divide Logres as well. There is no king and there are some strong lords: Duke Lindsey in the north and Duke Silchester in the south. The map of 495 gives the strongest political parties at that moment, although other powers have shifted the ones in Logres do not. So they are not unified front. In fact in 503 according to the GPC Malahaut and Escavalon fight over the spoils (being Duke Lindsey).

Thanks! I left Logres as one unit because I wanted people to know where the current boundaries of the land that would be considered Logres is. Also, we use the Book of the Warlord County maps as the county political maps, they work really well for the interior politics. It's difficult to make all of the distinguishing splits for all of the counties and maintain readability for all of the other smaller divisions. I've done some individual county maps for Rydychan, Ascalon, and Salisbury, but I don't have it done for everywhere yet. When I get all of the counties drawn, then I'll post one with the county divisions and we'll see how it looks

 

On 8/9/2019 at 8:26 AM, Cornelius said:

Not sure if Garloth is part of Lothian. The maps in the GPC say so, and  the text says King Nentres is King Lot's right hand man. But 512 Nentres is present at the battle at the the Bassus river (and killed there) as an ally of Malahaut, but Lot is apparantly not present. He could be there on his liege's orders, but I am not sure.

This confuses me too, it almost seems like he's independent at times and a vassal at times. It could be a very true medieval experience of chivalry here, but KAP feudalism is usually much cleaner. I opted to say he was a vassal and not list him independently. If anyone else has some thoughts on this one, I wouldn't be against split him off.

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26 minutes ago, Username said:

I left Cambenet out because it seems to be wilderness in the GPC. Though, perhaps that was a mistake. Do you know where I could find a map or anything to readjust the borders accordingly?

Perilous Forest has detailed maps of the area. You'll find (early) boundaries detailed also in the Book of Sires.

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3 hours ago, jeffjerwin said:

You'll find (early) boundaries detailed also in the Book of Sires.

The Cumbria map in p. 116 of BoSi is valid for Uther Period. Just to clarify that it is earlier than Perilous Forest (which is more around Romance), but it is late in BoSi's scheme of things. :)

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I was looking at the Book of Sires map for Cumbria. It's quite different from other maps. Which made me wonder. How are those maps drawn up? How are boundaries measured, how are roads drawn, and how are cities picked for inclusion? I have some data layers from a project that show roman roads from a UK archaeological database and those are different, I can't remember exactly how different, without looking at a map, but I'm certain their not so well dispersed geographically.

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18 hours ago, Username said:

It's quite different from other maps.

Which other maps?

18 hours ago, Username said:

How are boundaries measured, how are roads drawn, and how are cities picked for inclusion?

IIRC, Greg provided a list of things to include and then we discussed things a bit. The main thing for those maps was to provide context, i.e. where is a certain battle happening or when we reference to a place, that place should show up in the maps, too. But they were never intended to be complete, as in 'include everything'.

The roads are based on the Roman road network, but again, not all roads are shown. I do remember that I specifically asked for the Catterick - Durham - Carduel loop to be shown, simply because it would be the dominant road for the Wall and Nohaut.

As for the boundaries, the main map we were looking at was GPC p. 127. Those little tiny maps in GPC were often contradictory, so we ignored those most of the time. Since in 480s, Nohaut and Deira are quite powerful, we wanted to show that. Whether Holderness is part of Deira or Malahaut , and whether the Yorkshire Moors are part of Nohaut or Malahaut, can be debated, but since the former is still sparsely populated marshlands and the latter is deserted moors, it didn't really matter. Making the boundaries simpler made sense.

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You also need to remember, Book of Sires covers the years 439-484.  As Morien pointed out,

9 minutes ago, Morien said:

Those little tiny maps in GPC were often contradictory, so we ignored those most of the time. Since in 480s, Nohaut and Deira are quite powerful, we wanted to show that. Whether Holderness is part of Deira or Malahaut , and whether the Yorkshire Moors are part of Nohaut or Malahaut, can be debated, but since the former is still sparsely populated marshlands and the latter is deserted moors, it didn't really matter. Making the boundaries simpler made sense.

During the years of Uther, Anarchy, and Boy King, one can imagine the boundaries changing. You will also notice that each map is dated to some extent so you know when we say what the borders are.  

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5 hours ago, Morien said:

Which other maps

I was specifically talking about the GPC maps, but those were, as you mentioned, often contradictory. I'll look into doing one based on Book of Sires since that seems to be the more accurate.

5 hours ago, Hzark10 said:

During the years of Uther, Anarchy, and Boy King, one can imagine the boundaries changing. You will also notice that each map is dated to some extent so you know when we say what the borders are.  

Ha, it's so bad, I spread out that map for everyone to see and the group said, "Looks good, in 5 minutes it'll be obsolete though." 

The other thing that makes any sort of medieval mapping difficult is that power projection was limited in earlier times as well as the inability of the kingdoms to firmly establish anything but a fluid boundary. There are many conversations about how to properly describe the kingdom or other political units of a medieval period or any period pre-industrial nation-states. So, any of these boundaries should be considered and presented as very fluid or at least I try. Still there's something useful in trying to present boundaries as if they were a static thing.

5 hours ago, Morien said:

IIRC, Greg provided a list of things to include and then we discussed things a bit. The main thing for those maps was to provide context, i.e. where is a certain battle happening or when we reference to a place, that place should show up in the maps, too. But they were never intended to be complete, as in 'include everything'.

I didn't imagine they would be, as that would be a cluttered mess. I was just interested in how the decision was made. I  The roads I figured were some Roman as there was a mention of the King's Road being an old Roman road in an early book.  

Morien and Hzark10, thanks for the info. Let me know what you think when I get the next one done.

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3 hours ago, Username said:

The other thing that makes any sort of medieval mapping difficult is that power projection was limited in earlier times as well as the inability of the kingdoms to firmly establish anything but a fluid boundary.

 

Not to mention the relatively poor state of cartography. Most maps would probably be very good at detailing the areas and things close to a lord's center of power, and get less detailed and less accurate as it moved  further out - especially in regards to rough terrain such as forests and mountains. Chances are the maps we can use in the RPG are better and more accurate than what they might have had at the time. 

When running I note that all maps "in game" are subject to error and have, at times, used contradictory maps. In some cases I've seen groups go the long way from Point A to Point B simply because they were not aware of the true distances and directions between the two. 

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Chaos stalks my world, but she's a big girl and can take of herself.

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@Morien@Hzark10

How's it look now? I also added another map I did a while back for 485. I updated the Roman Road network I pulled from to reflect your comments about the loop near Hadrian's wall.

I added Ireland as it was in 531 with Dal Riada being as it is in the early part of the GPC. I noticed the Irish kingdoms line up really well with current Irish territorial subdivisions (counties?).

Also, where did the county borders come from for Book of Warlords and the like? It would help me to draw the counties if I could get access to those materials.

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Counties?
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On 8/16/2019 at 4:04 PM, Atgxtg said:

Chances are the maps we can use in the RPG are better and more accurate than what they might have had at the time.

You're without a doubt right, I'm very tempted to instead of making maps like these to give the players something like the Tabula Peutingeriana. Which, itself, would have been rare. My understanding is that many "maps" would have been little more than an itinerary like list of major locations with rough subjective distances.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Significant updates to the political map. The 485 map has been converted into a regional map, but I don't have the map at the moment. I'll add it later. I also added some county maps I did. If you're interested. I should have a 519 map done soon with all of the county borders draw in the political borders. I'll notify here when it's complete. 

Question: Should I keep posting the files to here? Or should I just let this thread die and do something else with them?

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@Uqbarian and @Cornelius Thanks! I was just concerned that my updates to this page were an annoyance to others, but I guess since no one had an opinion, then I'll keep it going. I'm currently working on a Roman War continental map. Which is leading to some interesting developments. Does anyone know the fates of Amans, Maris, Roestoc, and Pase by the time of the Roman War? Their fate is not mentioned in the GPC and Roestoc doesn't even seem to exist at that time. I would assume they join the northern lords, but not sure what is canon. While on the subject of minor kingdoms, in Brittany, is there a Brittany high king position equivalent? Are all of the Also, which Brittany kingdom does Aurelius, Uther, and Idres come from?

The other issue is I'm not sure how I want to make this one look stylistically. I'm thinking a more modern looking political map, but that seems a little boring. 

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Going by GPC page 126, Roestoc is also known as Elmet. (On page 121 Elmet is mentioned as a people or tribe allied with Malahaut, so it could be something like Elmet is the tribal name and Roestoc is the regional name.) As Elmet it shows up as an allied kingdom on some of the political maps for 519 and after (page 183); it's still around in 555 and 563. (It's also mentioned under the Conisbrough tournament in 549.)

Given the position of the 'Maris' label on the map on page 127, I'd guess the lordship of Maris is part of Elmet. (Leeds, Castleford, Doncaster and Conisborough are in Elmet. That could also fit the page 183 map, maybe?) The Humber is usually the southern border of Malahaut, I think. As Maris is the lordship of the Humber marsh folk, its lord might pay homage to both Elmet and Malahaut for the lands south and north of the river, or maybe it's just mainly on the south side. (The latter also kind of fits the 5.2 core book map.)

I'd say Pase falls with Lestroite and Rouse in the Pennines/West Cumbria tribal wilderness that generally shows up as a blank white patch on the political and event maps. I think these all remain independent through Arthur's reign, though under varying influence from Malahaut. Amans is probably the southern bulge of this white region, west of Elmet on the 519 map.

(The above is mainly going by GPC. The Book of Uther has the names in notably different positions, but 4e Perilous Forest roughly lines up with GPC. Amans and Pase are also mentioned as independent kingdoms in Savage Mountains, which covers 531-544.)

EDIT: As for Brittany, Aurelius and Uther go to Vannetais (according to the Book of Sires). Idres is of the Cornovii in the Kingdom of Cornwall, not Brittany. Vannetais is the oldest of the Cymric kingdoms in Brittany (since 395); that's why the kings of Vannetais are also called the kings of Brittany before other kingdoms are founded there. (There's not a high kingship of Brittany, as far as I can tell.) Domnonie is founded in 457, Cornouailles in 468. (I can't find info on Leon in GPC or BOS, but drawing on the possible historical and fictional parallels, my first thought is that Leon was settled by folk from Lyonesse. These could be Dumnonii who were driven out of Lyonesse by the Irish in the early fifth century, but as they don't join up with Domnonie, maybe they are bolstered in the 450s by families from both of the Cornish tribes (as well as some of the expelled Irish) who were sick of the Cornovii-Dumnonii wars and didn't want to choose one side or ther other.)

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In Book of Sires, Roestoc and Maris are independent kingdoms formed in 440s after the break-up of the Kingdom of Brigantines (of which Malahaut was the dominant part). As far as I know, they are still there in 520s.

Maris shows up as the place where Ector de Maris is from, the bastard son of King Ban and, I think, the daughter of the King of Maris. I don't have GPC with me at the moment, but IIRC, this happens after the Battle of Bedegraine (511), implying that Maris is friendly to King Arthur after that victory. They are a small kingdom, hidden in their swamps, so they wouldn't have a huge effect either way.

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5 minutes ago, Morien said:

Maris shows up as the place where Ector de Maris is from, the bastard son of King Ban and, I think, the daughter of the King of Maris. I don't have GPC with me at the moment, but IIRC, this happens after the Battle of Bedegraine (511), implying that Maris is friendly to King Arthur after that victory. They are a small kingdom, hidden in their swamps, so they wouldn't have a huge effect either way.

Of course! Yep, GPC has Ector de Maris being conceived after Bedegraine in 510 (page 133), though GPC describes Maris as a lordship rather than a kingdom.

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@Uqbarian My plan was to list them as allies of Arthur, but I was unsure if that had been changed with the changes to names.

That's interesting about Brittany. Speculation on my part, but it seems like Vannetais leads all of Brittany. They seem to be rather united in the pre-Uther period. I think it would be most accurate to represent Brittany as one political unit with "sub-kingdoms".

Idres is mentioned as the king of Cornwall and Brittany in year 497 of the GPC. In my opinion, it's pretty necessary for Idres to have that kind of support otherwise, his invasions should have never succeeded. Cornwall alone shouldn't support the troop number he needs. Would that make Idres King of Vannetais by 496?

Do we know what happens to the Breton subjects after Idres' death?

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9 hours ago, Uqbarian said:

Of course! Yep, GPC has Ector de Maris being conceived after Bedegraine in 510 (page 133), though GPC describes Maris as a lordship rather than a kingdom.

Maris and Roestoc are represented as enemies of the Fisher King in the Adventure of the Castle of Joy (c.517). I suspect they're neutral before Badon.

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14 hours ago, Uqbarian said:

EDIT: As for Brittany, Aurelius and Uther go to Vannetais (according to the Book of Sires). Idres is of the Cornovii in the Kingdom of Cornwall, not Brittany. Vannetais is the oldest of the Cymric kingdoms in Brittany (since 395); that's why the kings of Vannetais are also called the kings of Brittany before other kingdoms are founded there. (There's not a high kingship of Brittany, as far as I can tell.) Domnonie is founded in 457, Cornouailles in 468. (I can't find info on Leon in GPC or BOS, but drawing on the possible historical and fictional parallels, my first thought is that Leon was settled by folk from Lyonesse. These could be Dumnonii who were driven out of Lyonesse by the Irish in the early fifth century, but as they don't join up with Domnonie, maybe they are bolstered in the 450s by families from both of the Cornish tribes (as well as some of the expelled Irish) who were sick of the Cornovii-Dumnonii wars and didn't want to choose one side or ther other.)

There will be more on Brittany eventually. It did have a high kingship, at least in Geoffrey of Monmouth, with King Budic (Budec in the BoS). Earlier there are others, quite significant in Breton folklore.

Lyonesse is a form of the Irish Ui Liathain, a sea-going and mercenary tribe that colonized western Cornwall according to Irish legend. The name Liathain was Anglicized as Lyons in Ireland. But by the time of the BoS they have been conquered by the Cornovii. Leon would logically be another Irish colony (also absorbed into the Bretons), these dating probably to the time of the Barbarian Conspiracy.

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12 hours ago, Username said:

@Uqbarian My plan was to list them as allies of Arthur, but I was unsure if that had been changed with the changes to names.

That's interesting about Brittany. Speculation on my part, but it seems like Vannetais leads all of Brittany. They seem to be rather united in the pre-Uther period. I think it would be most accurate to represent Brittany as one political unit with "sub-kingdoms".

Idres is mentioned as the king of Cornwall and Brittany in year 497 of the GPC. In my opinion, it's pretty necessary for Idres to have that kind of support otherwise, his invasions should have never succeeded. Cornwall alone shouldn't support the troop number he needs. Would that make Idres King of Vannetais by 496?

Do we know what happens to the Breton subjects after Idres' death?

I'm pretty sure when GPC says 'king of Cornwall and Brittany', it really means 'king of Cornwall and western Brittany' or 'king of Cornwall and Cornish Brittany' (Domnonie, Cornouailles and possibly Leon). BoS has him as 'King of Cornwall and Domnonie', as Riothamus's heir; he doesn't have any claim to Vannetais, as far as I can tell. Vannetais is in charge of all of Brittany until the Cornish refugees (and/or Irish, following jeff above) start showing up in the relatively unpopulated western and northern parts, and then it appears to basically cede control of those parts to them.

I did find a high kingship reference on page 143, though it's in the context of the power struggle after Idres's death. Again, I think that's about Cornwall and western Brittany.

For some dates, King Meliau of Vannetais conquers Domnonie in 471 (pursuing a weak claim via Triphine, Meliau's sister and Riothamus's widow); Idres takes Domnonie and Cornouailles in 476-9. These (and Leon) may still have their own kings in the Uther period, and/or Vannetais may be paying tribute to Idres, to explain 'lesser kings of Brittany' in the GPC sidebar on page 25. Idres never actually conquers Vannetais, as far as I can tell.

After Idres dies in 513, his son Mark inherits his holdings in Cornwall and (western) Brittany. Mark and his vassal Hoel, Duke of Cornouailles (one time called king in GPC, but I think that's an error) are fighting a war with King Conon of Vannetais around 536. Mark and Tristram are also taking castles in Leon in 546, according to GPC; I'm not sure who they're fighting, but it might just be local rebel lords.

12 hours ago, jeffjerwin said:

There will be more on Brittany eventually. It did have a high kingship, at least in Geoffrey of Monmouth, with King Budic (Budec in the BoS). Earlier there are others, quite significant in Breton folklore.

Lyonesse is a form of the Irish Ui Liathain, a sea-going and mercenary tribe that colonized western Cornwall according to Irish legend. The name Liathain was Anglicized as Lyons in Ireland. But by the time of the BoS they have been conquered by the Cornovii. Leon would logically be another Irish colony (also absorbed into the Bretons), these dating probably to the time of the Barbarian Conspiracy.

Cool! Thanks for that.

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