How Much Can You Learn from a Single Map?
Clément Messeri
How much can you learn from a single map? Let’s narrow it down: how much information on a country’s history, geography, and development can you gather from a map where only a single metric is given?
From INSEE, IGN. nationwide pole in 2014, B. Coulmont
Here is a map of France where a simple measurement is made and given to us with the use of colored notation. Shown here is the proportion of buildings in the area built before 1919—the official end of the First World War. Dark blue means very few were built before the end of the war, whereas dark red means almost all buildings were built before this date. The point of this article is to show that a lot more information can be gathered, many aspects of French history can be illustrated, and an innumerable amount of geographical intricacies can be shown through this one simple measurement.
Let us start by examining the more obvious features of the map, the artifacts that jump out to any observer. Perhaps the clearest attribute of this map is the stark blue line that spreads from the Hauts de France to Verdun. This line very closely resembles the frontline of the First World War. The First World War, as far as military events go, went through three phases. An initial mobility phase, where highly mobile armies with horses were essential to grab as much territory as possible, saw the frontline move steadily into France’s national borders. A second entrenched phase saw the digging of trenches, and the front line stood still for a long time. And the third and final phase, when armies were more mobile and the Germans were pushed back, eventually ended the war. The aforementioned front line witnessed the firing of an unimaginable tonnage of artillery shells, completely and utterly destroying any form of urban development there. Even hills and forests were wiped off the face of the Earth within months. Consequently, any building that predated the war was simply gone—reverted to dust. This is the history told through the clear contrast of the front line and the surroundings.
The surroundings are indeed older, with a non-negligible proportion of buildings predating the War. These, however, are not the oldest parts of France. Following World War One, many parts of northeastern France have been rebuilt. This is not true, however, for la France du Vide, or “the France of Emptiness.” This slightly outdated term used in high school geography classes refers to the parts of central France that are less involved in the economic development and urbanization of the Country. This aspect of French geography alone deserves an entire article if not a book, and it is illustrated on the map through the clearly older, less developed inland of France.
In contrast with this more rural France, Paris is clearly urbanized and has been getting more and more developed since the end of World War Two. On the map, this is made clear with how the dark blue, more modern urban areas surround the older Haussmannien city center. Historically, France saw a large increase in its population during the Baby Boom Era. Consequently, the rural areas around city centers quickly became more urbanized in the 60s and 70s. This is what we are seeing around Paris and any major city in France. These new urban areas (called villes nouvelles in French) are illustrated by the blue blotches dispersed around France. You may recognize Toulouse, Lyon, or Bordeaux to name a few.
Some other artifacts are less easily explained away. For example, why is it that almost all of France’s coasts postdate World War One? In effect, all of the coasts are dark blue with the notable exception of a few areas in Normandy. This can be traced back to the 70s when France made it necessary for employers to provide paid leave for their employees. This meant that, for a majority of families, going on vacation was now a welcome reality. Consequently, a whole new industry sprung into existence: tourist attractions. Plenty of coastal towns like Saint Tropez in the French Riviera became hotspots for these new vacations and were therefore rebuilt and modernized in the 70s and 80s. As a small aside, the famous French movies Les Bronzés, released in 1978, perfectly encapsulate this emerging facet of French life. Similarly, Alpine regions of Savoie saw a similar development, hence why that region is also a darker blue.
It would be even more interesting to see how this measurement evolved over time, starting from 1919. We can picture the entire map starting dark red and slowly seeing blots of blue appearing as renovations take place immediately after the war, as consequences of WWII, as cities developed in the 50s and 60s, and as popular vacation destinations developed as a consequence of paid leave in the 60s and 70s. This would also more strongly underline the parts of France that did not change as much, that were not as affected by these political, historical, and geographical actors. If anything, such information could be used to target development projects to regions and cities that would greatly benefit from them. The country would henceforth be more developed and the term La France du Vide can finally become obsolete. However, one must also keep in mind that urbanization is not the only form of development, and there is no direct correlation between the older parts of France (as shown on this map), and their development.