Improved Map of India, 1820

This map, published in London around 1820, reflects the consolidation phase of the East India Company's dominion over the Indian subcontinent. Based on the most recent surveys and "authentic" materials, it was conceived as a large scientific wall map and at the same time as a tool for imperial governance. The accurate engraving shows colored provincial borders, a dense toponymy of cities, rivers and mountain ranges from Punjab and Tibet to Ceylon, indicating both the territories under British control and the allied princely states. The work, attributed to the early nineteenth-century English cartographic tradition, combines encyclopedic ambition and propaganda function, offering the European public an updated and ordered image of colonial India.

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