The surface of the earth covers 510 million square kilometres. For centuries, people across the world have tried to render this great planet intelligible by reproducing it on a smaller scale in the form of world maps. This richly illustrated volume traces the history of the Western conception of the world through unique maps and globes, from medieval mappae mundi and early modern cartographic revolutions to contemporary perspectives shaped by satellite mapping. The book also reflects on how each age projected its own worldview into cartographic representation, while several contemporary artists add their own mirrorings of the world to this historical narrative. This work presents a continuous historical and thematic survey of world cartography from the Middle Ages to the present, examining medieval cosmographies, portolan traditions, Renaissance mapping, discoveries and imperial cartographies, scientific and Enlightenment transformations, printed atlases, globes, colonial worldviews, and modern conceptual and digital mapping. Through reproductions of significant maps, scholarly commentary and exhibition-based interpretation, the volume combines cartographic history, visual analysis and intellectual history. It functions both as an exhibition catalogue and as a sourcebook on changing representations of geographic knowledge and cultural perceptions of the world.