01769nas a2200205   4500000000100000008004100001260003100042653002100073653001200094653000900106653002200115653001200137653001600149100001700165245010700182856015200289300001200441520106800453020004201521                                       d  bSpringer Berlin Heidelberg10aLocal conditions10amapping10aMaps10aMaterial cultures10aSurveys10aWest Bengal1 aKeith Lilley00aSurveying Empires: Archaeologies of Colonial Cartography and the Great Trigonometrical Survey of India  uhttps://www.scopus.com/inward/record.uri?eid=2-s2.0-85072855126&doi=10.1007%2f978-3-030-23447-8_6&partnerID=40&md5=9406492d9833d0545bfe3fe729330444  a101-1203 aThis paper demonstrates the important contribution material culture makes to histories of cartography. Focusing on the tangible and intangible heritage of the Great Trigonometrical Survey (GTS) of India, and West Bengal in particular, the material landscape legacies of the GTS are analysed and interpreted. This reveals new insights into how surveys of the GTS were undertaken in the nineteenth century, under George Everest, and the infrastructure that was created to underpin the British mapping of India. The trigonometrical stations built by the GTS were of different designs and construction, adapted in response to local conditions and circumstances. Today, this ‘survey heritage’ is at risk, yet provides a basis for understanding more deeply the materiality of mapping and survey practices used in mapping empires. The paper connects the three-dimensional ‘spaces of survey’ with the two-dimensional ‘space of the map’, and concludes by arguing for greater consideration of the verticality of mapping. © 2020, Springer Nature Switzerland AG.  a18632246 (ISSN); 9783030234461 (ISBN)