An Actual Survey of All Principal Roads of England and Wales

Historical Context

John Ogilby

John Ogilby (1600-1676) was a Scottish translator, cartographer, poet, printer, publisher, and innovator best known for his work Britannia, an innovative road atlas encompassing 7,500 miles of routes throughout England and Wales. After spending much of his early life focused on theater and translating the classicals of Virgil, Homer, and Aesop, Ogilby turned his focus to his interests in geography and mapmaking. In response to the Great Fire of London in 1666, Ogilby was placed on a team led by Robert Hooke to settle land disputes throughout the city. During this period to help solve the disputes, Ogilby is credited with his survey of London. With the success of his survey and subsequent atlases of different regions of the world, King Charles II appointed Ogilby to be Royal Cosmographer and in charge of producing an atlas of Britain, which would turn into his Britannia.

Britannia

Britannia is Ogilby's road atlas of England and Wales published in 1675 which highlights 100 of the most major routes of using Ogibly’s innovation strip map layout. The atlas is credited in the field of cartography for several designs and measurement methods that alter the ways future maps would be created. To garner support for this project, Ogilby pitched his idea for a precise road map of the most important routes through England as a method of improving “commerce and correspondency” throughout King Charles II sovereign land. Covering over 26,000 miles and taking five years to produce, the survey resulted in the first version of Britannia weighing almost 8 kg. Due to the vast size of the land to be surveyed and methods used, Ogilby’s fundraising was critical for Britannia completion. It is estimated that the cost of the survey was no less than £20,000, of which King Charles II paid at least £500 and another £500 on behalf of his royal consult. The list of subscribers that stood alongside Charles II in funding the projects were largely wealthy aristocrats and academic societies, namely the Royal Society.

King Charles II, King Louis XIV, and Britannia Conspiracy Theory

Some scholars have questioned the intentions of King Charles II support that gave Ogilby that ability to complete his survey and atlas. The theory proposes that Charles II's main intentions for the production of Ogilby’s atlas were strategic for military purposes. These historians revolve their argument around the well-documented Secret Treaty of Dover of 1670. The treaty was essentially a plan for Charles II to publicly announce his conversion to Catholicism, and in return, be given financial and military support from King Louis XIV of France, his cousin, in a war against the Dutch during the height of the Anglo-Dutch Wars. The speculation about a possible connection between the treaty and the creation of Ogibly’s Britannia arises from the very first engraved route of the atlas from Aberystwyth, an insignificant port town in Wales, to London. Considering that the Treaty of Dover would require Louis XIV to send 6,000 French troops to protect Charles II in the event of a rebellion and the questionable decision to include a route from Aberystwyth to London while excluding a route from the more important Liverpool to London, some historians have hypothesized that under the direction of Charles II, Ogibly included the route as a clear path for French troops to make an undefended march to London. Despite a few avid supporters of the theory, many scholars still remain skeptical and argue against it.