Add Yahoo as a preferred source to see more of our stories on Google. When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission. The Mercator map, created ...

The African Union is championing a drive to replace the 16th-century Mercator world map, arguing its widespread use by governments and international bodies inaccurately depicts Africa's true scale.

In 1569, Flemish mapmaker Gerardus Mercator synthesized existing ideas in navigation and cartography to create a new type of world map. It has stood the test of time: Billions of people would ...

The Mercator world map, long a fixture in classrooms globally, makes the European Union appear almost as large as Africa. In reality, Africa is more than seven times bigger. It is a distortion that ...

The African Union has joined a campaign calling for the widely-used Mercator map, which makes Africa appear smaller than it is, to be replaced with a map that more accurately reflects the continent's ...