Editorial

Abstract

A reconstruction is made of the methods by which the Ordnance Survey of Great Britain pioneered a system for establishing the place-name nomenclature on its maps in the nineteenth century. Until 1820 there was little to differentiate the practice of the Survey from that of earlier cartographers but, thereafter, official surveyors were encouraged to consult a wide range of written and oral authorities and were instructed to record their findings in special name books. By the mid-nineteenth century the essentials of the modern system had been laid down and many thousands of local names published in map form for the first time.

This paper was read in a shorter form to the annual symposium of the Society in September 1970, at the University of Bristol.