The ''Geographers' A–Z Street Atlas'', commonly shortened to ''A–Z'' (pronounced "Ay to Zed"), is a title given to any one of a range of atlases of streets in the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and North ...

produced by Geographers' A–Z Map Company Limited. Its first atlas, of

London London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...

, was originally compiled in the 1930s by

Phyllis Pearsall Phyllis Isobella Pearsall MBE (25 September 1906 – 28 August 1996) was a British painter and writer who founded the Geographers' A-Z Map Company, for which she is regarded as one of the most successful business people of the twentieth cen ...

. The company she founded now publishes street maps of many cities and towns in the UK.

Dating old maps

Until relatively recently, maps produced by the ''Geographers' (A–Z) Map Company'' did not include a publication date. It is possible to determine a date range for publication due to the following: * their first map was published in 1936; * the only maps produced by them during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

(1939–1945) were war maps of Europe; * until 1962, the "Published By" address was ''24

Grays Inn Road Gray's Inn Road (or Grays Inn Road) is an important road in the Bloomsbury district of Central London, in the London Borough of Camden. The road begins at the City of London boundary, where it bisects High Holborn, and ends at King's Cross and ...

Holborn Holborn ( or ) is a district in central London, which covers the south-eastern part of the London Borough of Camden and a part ( St Andrew Holborn Below the Bars) of the Ward of Farringdon Without in the City of London. The area has its roots ...

, London''; * from 1962 to 1992, the "Published By" address was ''

Sevenoaks Sevenoaks is a town in Kent with a population of 29,506 situated south-east of London, England. Also classified as a civil parish, Sevenoaks is served by a commuter main line railway into London. Sevenoaks is from Charing Cross, the traditio ...

, Kent''; * from 1992 onwards, the "Published By" address is ''

Borough Green Borough Green is situated in the borough of Tonbridge and Malling in Kent, England. The central area is situated on the A25 road between Maidstone and Sevenoaks, with the M26 motorway running through the centre dividing Wrotham and Borough Green. ...

, Kent''; * in 1972, the company name was changed from ''Geographers' Map Company'' to '' Geographers' A–Z Map Company''.

Coded date

On all A–Z maps, there is a three or four letter code in one of the corners, often the one containing the key. These letters represent numbers, which are the cartographic date, in the form (M)MYY. There was at least one scheme used, and perhaps a second. In one scheme, the letters JIHGFEDCBA represent the digits 1 to 9 and 0, so that HFD would be 357, indicating a publication date of March 1957. This seems to have been used on all the company's folding maps, and possibly also those in book form.

Media appearance

The ''Geographers' A–Z Street Atlas'' and the story of how

came to write the first edition covering

were featured in a 2005 episode of

Nicholas Crane Nicholas Crane (born 6 May 1954) is an English geographer, explorer, writer and broadcaster. Since 2004 he has written and presented four television series for BBC Two: ''Coast'', ''Great British Journeys'', '' Map Man'' and ''Town''. Early ...

's '' Map Man'' TV programme. This revealed that, on all their maps, A–Z print a non-existent

trap street In cartography, a trap street is a fictitious entry in the form of a misrepresented street on a map, often outside the area the map nominally covers, for the purpose of "trapping" potential plagiarists of the map who, if caught, would be unable ...

so that they can tell if a map has been illegally copied from theirs, a technique used by several publishers of reference works (see

fictitious entry Fictitious or fake entries are deliberately incorrect entries in reference works such as dictionaries, encyclopedias (including Wikipedia), maps, and directories. There are more specific terms for particular kinds of fictitious entry, such as Mo ...

). The story of Pearsall's development of the A–Z also inspired the musical ''

The A–Z of Mrs P ''The A–Z of Mrs P'' is a musical conceived by Neil Marcus and written by British playwright Diane Samuels and British composer Gwyneth Herbert. Described as "a musical fable inspired by the autobiographies of Phyllis Pearsall", it tells t ...

''. The London A–Z is a plot device in "

The Blind Banker "The Blind Banker" is the second episode of the television series '' Sherlock,'' first broadcast on BBC One and BBC HD on 1 August 2010. It was written by Stephen Thompson and directed by Euros Lyn. ''Sherlock'' is a loose adaptation of Arthur ...

", the second episode of the first series of the BBC drama '' Sherlock'' when the protagonist is attempting to decipher a book code used by an international smuggling ring based on a book "everybody owns". After attempting to decipher the code using a

dictionary A dictionary is a listing of lexemes from the lexicon of one or more specific languages, often arranged alphabetically (or by radical and stroke for ideographic languages), which may include information on definitions, usage, etymologies ...

and the

Bible The Bible (from Koine Greek , , 'the books') is a collection of religious texts or scriptures that are held to be sacred in Christianity, Judaism, Samaritanism, and many other religions. The Bible is an anthologya compilation of texts of a ...

, Sherlock goes out into

Baker Street Baker Street is a street in the Marylebone district of the City of Westminster in London. It is named after builder William Baker, who laid out the street in the 18th century. The street is most famous for its connection to the fictional detec ...

and appropriates a copy of the A–Z after seeing it being used by a couple of tourists.

2012 Olympics

''Geographers' A–Z Map Company'' was the official supplier of atlases and maps for the 2012 Olympic Games and

2012 Paralympic Games The 2012 Summer Paralympics, branded as the London 2012 Paralympic Games, were an international multi-sport parasports event held from 29 August to 9 September 2012 in London, England, United Kingdom. They were the 14th Summer Paralympic Gam ...

and produced detailed maps for the Olympic Park in Stratford, as well as all the other venues that were used during the games in

and throughout the

. They produced three special maps detailing transport information on getting to the venues and also provided information on events related to the

2012 Cultural Olympiad The 2012 Cultural Olympiad was a programme of cultural events across the United Kingdom that accompanied the 2012 Summer Olympics and 2012 Summer Paralympics. The Olympic Charter, the set of rules and guidelines for the organization of the Olympi ...

. In addition, A–Z provided special sections relating to the Games in their 2012 editions of their main UK-wide and local maps.

External links

*
Phyllis Pearsall: founder of Geographers' A–Z Map Company

Sources