Oceans, Islands, Continents, and British Imperial Ambitions in the World Maps of Herman Moll, 1700–32

Oceans figured prominently in Herman Moll’s maps of the world but they were visually overshadowed by his superbly detailed engravings of islands and continental landmasses, the ostensible focus of his exquisite cartography. The foremost British mapmaker of his day, Moll’s keen cartographic interest in certain landmasses and islands made sense once these landmasses and the resources they harbored were visualized in the wider context he intended: their availability to British interests via the ‘world ocean.’ Representing in cartographic terms a widespread notion among British elites in the early 18^th century that effective control of the world’s oceans would constitute a formidable “Empire of the Deep,” Moll consciously mapped oceans as aqueous highways that allowed British commercial and political contact with every region of the world but he paid particular attention to the harbors and coasts of the Americas and South Asia. The wind currents, seascapes, and views of ships, entrepôts, and maritime activity that he etched onto his maps provided important visual, symbolic and mental clues for interpreting the superbly detailed terrestrial shapes that appeared to be the focus of his cartography. Those clues revealed that proper understanding of oceans would allow Britain to increase its involvement with distant islands and continents with the goal of satisfying British ambitions to world-wide empire.