Italian Campaigns
![Printed map. “Présentée au general Bonaparte, Premier consul de la République Françoise, Par le Général P. Dupont. Chef de l'Etat-Major-Général de cette Armée”. Four visual scales, 121 mm = 8 Huit Myriamètres. Insets: Ordre de bataille de l’armée de réserve le 24 Floreal an 8, Ordre de bataille de l’armée se reserve le 25 Praiial an 8, and [view of Army crossing mountains]. Date is derived from "Floreál, An 8. " which is the equivalent of 1799-1800. Acquired as part of the Cholmondely Collection.](/files/original/877a6cc6efb9ea8e9d48de014a3c84f0.jpg "Printed map. “Présentée au general Bonaparte, Premier consul de la République Françoise, Par le Général P. Dupont. Chef de l'Etat-Major-Général de cette Armée”. Four visual scales, 121 mm = 8 Huit Myriamètres. Insets: Ordre de bataille de l’armée de réserve le 24 Floreal an 8, Ordre de bataille de l’armée se reserve le 25 Praiial an 8, and [view of Army crossing mountains]. Date is derived from \"Floreál, An 8. \" which is the equivalent of 1799-1800. Acquired as part of the Cholmondely Collection.")
Carté générale des marches, positions, combats et batailles de l'armée de réserve, depuis le passage du Grand St. Bernard le 24 floréal, An 8. Jusqu'à la Victoire complette et décisive remportée à Marengo le 25 Prairial suivant.
Geographer: Dupont de L’Etang, Pierre Antoine
Date: 1800
Napoleon's victory against the Austrians at the battle of Marengo, in June of 1800, was fought on the outskirts of Alessandria in Piedmont, Italy (then Sardinia) after an earlier daring crossing of the Alps through the 'Great St. Bernard Pass.' It fuelled a propaganda campaign intended to mythologize the victory in order to help solidify Napoleon's position as First Consul of France in the wake of his coup d'etat the previous November. Part of the propaganda generated in this effort was the production of this map commemorating the battle, by Count Pierre Antoine Dupont de L'Etang, who served as Chief of General Staff under Louis-Alexandre Berthier, Commander of the Army of Reserve at Marengo.
McMaster University Library
Lloyd Reeds Map Collection
Rare Map Collection no. 9247
http://digitalarchive.mcmaster.ca/islandora/object/macrepo%3A81376
Carta degli stati di S. M.il RE di Sardegna
Geographer: Dury, Andrew
Date: 1765
The map’s title may be a little misleading today, as the geography depicted is not that of the Isle of Sardinia but of the Piedmont area of northwest Italy and southeast France, extending as far north as Switzerland. At the time of the map’s creation, however, it was part of the Kingdom of Sardinia.
This map marks an intermediary step between the centuries-old practice of the use of pictorial relief as demonstrated on the ‘untitled’ map of Germany (RMC no.9275, in this exhibit) and the more scientifically derived, representational technique employed on ‘A new map of Spain and Portugal’ (RMC no.4384, also in this exhibit).
Although it gives us an improved sense of the shape and size of the mountain ranges compared with other pictorial maps, it is still drawn from an oblique angle rather than a vertical, thereby blocking features from our view and retaining a feel more akin to an illustration of Tolkien’s Mordor than a cartographic map of the Swiss Alps.
McMaster University Library
Lloyd Reeds Map Collection
Rare Map Collection no. 9259
http://digitalarchive.mcmaster.ca/islandora/object/macrepo%3A81067