- Map types
- Physical or bump maps
- Political maps
- Geological maps
- Climatic maps
- Topographic maps
- Linguistic maps
- Tourist maps
- Time zone maps
We explain to you what are the types of maps and the characteristics of physical, political, geological, climatic, topographic maps and more.
Map types
The maps are the cartographic documents par excellence, which consist of a graphic or visual representation of the Earth's surface, distinguishing the edges of the continental shelf and the ocean, among other possible characteristics of a topographic, political, demographic nature, and so on.
In fact, depending on the type of information that they contain, the maps can be of different types: this is their most common form of classification. Thus, we can speak of political, demographic, topographic maps, etc., all considered "thematic" maps, that is, that highlight a topic above the rest of the information.
Another possible classification of the maps attends to the scale used to represent this information, thus distinguishing between maps on a small scale (less than 1: 100,000) and large-scale (greater than 1: 10,000).
Physical or bump maps
They are those that represent the planetary surface, emphasizing the geographical features and the relief that characterize it, such as moutains, the valleys, depressions, etc., usually indicating the height values, humidity and vegetation. They are maps of very common use, in academic and informative fields.
Political maps
They are those that represent the earth's surface taking into account the political-administrative division of the nations, that is, the borders between countries, and indicating the cities capitals and other important data, such as important localities, names of regions and usually rivers, mountains and natural regions featured.
Geological maps
As their name indicates, they are those that represent the earth's surface from a geological point of view, that is, they look at the distinctions between the types of minerals, sediments and materials that compose it, as well as the resources of economic value or deposits. featured. They also take place in them volcanoes, geological faults and seismic regions, generally.
Climatic maps
They are those that are fixed not so much on the earth's surface, as on the state of the atmospheric gaseous mass that determines the climates. Thus, they tend to divide the world into climatic regions, that is, into areas in which one type of climate predominates over others. They should not be confused with maps meteorological, which represent the temporary atmospheric phenomena that occur in a region, such as those used for weather forecasting.
Topographic maps
Topographic maps are those that represent the earth's surface taking note of the altitudes and landforms for each region. In other words, they pay attention to natural and artificial elevations and use a specific, technical terminology that provides specific information about the three-dimensionality of the world.
Linguistic maps
Those who no longer attend to the surface of the planet, but rather indicate the idiomatic tendencies of those who inhabit it, that is, the ways in which one or more Languages, dialects or linguistic phenomena are distributed among the different populations region of. There may be linguistic maps that are fixed in different languages, or that attend to the geographic variants of the same language.
Tourist maps
Those that represent the planetary surface of a region, emphasizing the relevant information for those who want to visit and / or know it, such as monuments, historical locations, national parks, cities of importance and commercial or gastronomic regions.
Time zone maps
Those that represent the totality of the earth's surface, or perhaps some of its continents especially, together with the layout of the meridians that determine the time zones of each region, that is, the official time of each country (or its interior regions, if any).