Editing Gazetteer (section)

==History==
{{Further|History of geography|History of cartography}}

===Western world===

====Hellenistic and Greco-Roman eras====
[[File:PtolemyWorldMap.jpg|thumb|right|A 15th-century manuscript copy of the [[Ptolemy world map]], reconstituted from Ptolemy's ''Geographia'' ({{circa|150}}), indicating the countries of "[[Serica]]" and "Sinae" ([[China]]) at the extreme right, beyond the island of "Taprobane" ([[Sri Lanka]], oversized) and the "Aurea Chersonesus" ([[Malay Peninsula]]).]]
[[File:London - John Norden's map of 1593.jpg|thumb|[[John Norden]]'s map of [[London]] published in 1593]]
[[File:Bedford - John Speed's map (1611).jpg|thumb|right|[[John Speed]]'s map of "[[Bedford]]e", from his ''Theatre of the Empire of Great Britaine'', published in 1611]]
[[File:Brit IndianEmpireReligions3.jpg|thumb|right|"[[Religion in India|Prevailing Religions]] of the [[British Raj|British Indian Empire]]", from the [[The Imperial Gazetteer of India|Imperial Gazetteer of India]], [[Oxford University Press]], 1909]]
[[File:North America 1797 - U.S. Bureau of the Census, 1909.jpg|thumb|right|American geographer [[Jedidiah Morse]]'s "A New Map of North America Shewing all the New Discoveries" from his gazetteer of 1797]]
In his journal article "Alexander and the Ganges" (1923), the 20th-century historian [[William Woodthorpe Tarn|W.W. Tarn]] calls a list and description of [[satrap]]ies of [[Alexander the Great|Alexander's Empire]] written between 324 and 323 BC as an ancient gazetteer.<ref name="tarn 93 94">Tarn, 93–94.</ref> Tarn notes that the document is dated no later than June 323&nbsp;BC, since it features [[Partition of Babylon|Babylon as not yet partitioned]] by Alexander's generals.<ref name="tarn 94">Tarn, 94.</ref> It was revised by the Greek historian [[Diodorus Siculus]] in the 1st century BC.<ref name="tarn 94"/> In the 1st century BC, [[Dionysius of Halicarnassus]] mentioned the [[chronicle]]-type format of the writing of the [[Logographer (history)|logographers]] in the age before the founder of the Greek historiographic tradition, [[Herodotus]] (i.e.,&nbsp;before the 480s&nbsp;BC), saying "they did not write connected accounts but instead broke them up according to peoples and cities, treating each separately".<ref name="brown 1954 837">Brown (1954), 837.</ref> Historian [[Truesdell Sparhawk Brown|Truesdell S. Brown]] asserts that what Dionysius describes in this quote about the logographers should be categorized not as a true "history" but rather as a gazetteer.<ref name="brown 1954 837"/> While discussing the Greek conception of the [[river delta]] in ancient Greek literature, Francis Celoria notes that both [[Ptolemy]] and [[Pausanias (geographer)|Pausanias]] of the 2nd century AD provided gazetteer information on geographical terms.<ref name="celoria 387">Celoria, 387.</ref>

Perhaps predating Greek gazetteers were those made in [[ancient Egypt]]. Although she does not specifically label the document as a gazetteer, [[Penelope Wilson]] (Department of Archaeology, [[Durham University]]) describes an ancient Egyptian [[papyrus]] found at the site of [[Tanis, Egypt]] (a city founded during the [[Twentieth dynasty of Egypt]]), which provides the following for each [[Nome (Egypt)|administrative area of Egypt]] at the time:<ref name="wilson 2003 98">Wilson (2003), 98.</ref>

<blockquote>...the name of a nome capital, its sacred barque, its sacred tree, its cemetery, the date of its festival, the names of forbidden objects, the local god, land, and lake of the city. This interesting codification of data, probably made by a priest, is paralleled by very similar editions of data on the temple walls at Edfu, for example.<ref name="wilson 2003 98"/></blockquote>

====Medieval and early modern eras====
The ''[[Domesday Book]]'' initiated by [[William&nbsp;I of England]] in 1086 was a government survey on all the administrative counties of England; it was used to assess the properties of farmsteads and landholders in order to tax them sufficiently. In the survey, numerous English [[castle]]s were listed; scholars debate on exactly how many were actually referenced in the book.<ref name="harfield 372">Harfield, 372.</ref> However, the ''Domesday Book'' does detail the fact that out of 3,558 registered houses destroyed in 112 different boroughs listed, 410 of these destroyed houses were the direct result of castle construction and expansion.<ref name="harfield 373 374">Harfield, 373–374.</ref> In 1316 the [[Nomina Villarum]] survey was initiated by [[Edward II of England]]; it was essentially a list of all the administrative subdivisions throughout England which could be utilized by the state in order to assess how much military troops could be conscripted and summoned from each region.<ref name="ravenhill 425">Ravenhill, 425.</ref> The ''[[Speculum Britanniae]]'' (1596) of the [[Tudor dynasty|Tudor era]] English cartographer and topographer [[John Norden]] (1548–1625) had an alphabetical list of places throughout England with headings showing their [[Hundred (country subdivision)|administrative hundreds]] and referenced to attached maps.<ref name="ravenhill 424">Ravenhill, 424.</ref> Englishman [[John Speed]]'s ''Theatre of the Empire of Great Britaine'' published in 1611 provided gazetteers for counties throughout England, which included illustrative maps, short local histories, a list of administrative hundreds, an index of [[parish]]es, and the coordinates of [[longitude]] and [[latitude]] for county towns.<ref name="ravenhill 426">Ravenhill, 426.</ref> Starting in 1662, the Hearth Tax Returns with attached maps of local areas were compiled by individual parishes throughout England while a duplicate of their records were sent to the central government offices of the [[Exchequer]].<ref name="ravenhill 425"/> To supplement his "new large Map of England" from 1677, the English cartographer [[John Adams (cartographer)|John Adams]] compiled the extensive gazetteer "Index Villaris" in 1680 that had some 24,000 places listed with geographical coordinates coinciding with the map.<ref name="ravenhill 424"/> The "Geographical Dictionary" of [[Edmund Bohun]] was published in [[London]] in 1688, comprising 806 pages with some 8,500 entries.<ref name="white 657">White, 657.</ref> In his work, Edmund Bohun attributed the first known Western geographical dictionary to geographer [[Stephanus of Byzantium]] (fl. 6th century) while also noting influence in his work from the ''Thesaurus Geographicus'' (1587) by the [[Belgium|Belgian]] cartographer [[Abraham Ortelius]] (1527–1598), but stated that Ortelius' work dealt largely with ancient geography and not up-to-date information.<ref name="white 657"/> Only fragments of Stephanus' geographical work ''Ethnica'' (Εθνικά) have survived and were first examined by the Italian printer [[Aldus Manutius]] in his work of 1502.

The Italian monk [[Filippo Ferrari|Phillippus Ferrarius]] (d.&nbsp;1626) published his geographical dictionary "Epitome Geographicus in Quattuor Libros Divisum" in the Swiss city of [[Zürich]] in 1605.<ref name="white 656">White, 656.</ref> He divided this work into overhead topics of cities, rivers, mountains, and lakes and swamps.<ref name="white 656"/> All placenames, given in [[Latin]], were arranged in alphabetical order for each overhead division by geographic type;.<ref name="white 656"/> A year after his death, his "Lexicon Geographicum" was published, which contained more than 9,000 different entries for geographic places.<ref name="white 656"/> This was an improvement over Ortelius' work, since it included modern placenames and places discovered since the time of Ortelius.<ref name="white 656"/>

[[Pierre Duval (geographer)|Pierre Duval]] (1618–1683), a nephew of the French cartographer [[Nicolas Sanson]], wrote various geographical dictionaries. These include a dictionary on the [[abbey]]s of France, a dictionary on ancient sites of the [[Assyria]]ns, [[Persian Empire|Persians]], [[Ancient Greece|Greeks]], and [[Ancient Rome|Romans]] with their modern equivalent names, and a work published in [[Paris]] in 1651 that was both the first universal and [[vernacular]] geographical dictionary of Europe.<ref name="white 657"/> With the gradual expansion of [[Laurence Echard]]'s (d.&nbsp;1730) gazetteer of 1693, it too became a universal geographical dictionary that was translated into [[Spanish language|Spanish]] in 1750, into [[French language|French]] in 1809, and into [[Italian language|Italian]] in 1810.<ref name="white 659">White, 659.</ref>

Following the [[American Revolutionary War]], United States clergyman and historian [[Jeremy Belknap]] and [[United States Postmaster General|Postmaster General]] [[Ebenezer Hazard]] intended to create the first post-revolutionary geographical works and gazetteers, but they were anticipated by the clergyman and geographer [[Jedidiah Morse]] with his ''Geography Made Easy'' in 1784.<ref>Brown (1941), 153–154.</ref> However, Morse was unable to finish the gazetteer in time for his 1784 geography and postponed it.<ref name="brown 1941 189"/> Yet his delay to publish it lasted too long, as it was Joseph Scott in 1795 who published the first post-revolutionary American gazetteer, his ''Gazetteer of the United States''.<ref name="brown 1941 189">Brown (1941), 189.</ref> With the aid of [[Noah Webster]] and Rev. Samuel Austin, Morse finally published his gazetteer ''The American Universal Geography'' in 1797.<ref name="brown 1941 189 190">Brown (1941), 189–190.</ref> However, Morse's gazetteer did not receive distinction by literary critics, as gazetteers were deemed as belonging to a lower literary class.<ref name="brown 1941 190">Brown (1941), 190.</ref> The reviewer of Joseph Scott's 1795 gazetteer commented that it was "little more than medleys of politics, history and miscellaneous remarks on the manners, languages and arts of different nations, arranged in the order in which the territories stand on the map".<ref name="brown 1941 190"/> Nevertheless, in 1802 Morse followed up his original work by co-publishing ''A New Gazetteer of the Eastern Continent'' with Rev. Elijah Parish, the latter of whom Ralph H. Brown asserts did the "lion's share of the work in compiling it".<ref name="brown 1941 194">Brown (1941), 194.</ref>

====Modern era====
Gazetteers became widely popular in [[United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland|Britain]] in the 19th century, with publishers such as [[Archibald Fullarton|Fullarton]], [[William Mackenzie (publisher)|Mackenzie]], [[William Chambers (publisher)|Chambers]] and [[Johnston Press#History|W & A.&nbsp;K. Johnston]], many of whom were [[Scotland|Scottish]], meeting public demand for information on an expanding Empire. This British tradition continues in the electronic age with innovations such as the [[National Land and Property Gazetteer]], the text-based [[Gazetteer for Scotland]], and the new (2008) [[National Gazetteer (for Scotland)]], formerly known as the Definitive National Address – Scotland National Gazetteer. In addition to local or regional gazetteers, there have also been comprehensive world gazetteers published; an early example would be the 1912 world gazetteer published by [[Lippincott Williams & Wilkins]].<ref name="aurousseau 66">Aurousseau, 66.</ref> There are also interregional gazetteers with a specific focus, such as the gazetteer of the Swedish atlas "Das Bästas Bilbok" (1969), a road atlas and guide for [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], and [[Denmark]].<ref name="murphy 113">Murphy, 113.</ref>

The 19th century was also a time that gazetteers became popular in American states. Massachusetts, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Virginia were among states with their own versions. Other states appeared in collections, such as ''The New England Gazetteer'' (1839).<ref>Hayward, J. ''The New England Gazetteer''. 9<sup>th</sup> edition. Concord, NH: Boyd & White, 1839</ref> and ''The Western Gazetteer'' (1817).<ref>Brown, S.R. ''The Western Gazetteer; or, Emigrant's directory, containing a geographical description of the western states and territories, viz. the states of Kentucky, Indiana, Louisiana, Ohio, Tennessee and Mississippi: and the territories of Illinois, Missouri, Alabama, Michigan, and North-Western. '' Auburn, NY:  H.C. Southwick. 1817</ref>    New York State, which underwent rapid changes in population and infrastructure (canals; railroads) during the 19th century, saw published at least six substantial gazetteers.<ref>Goodman, W.M. “New York’s Century of Gazetteers: 1800-1899”. ''NewYorkAlmanack'' website. April 24, 2025.  URL: <nowiki>https://www.newyorkalmanack.com/2025/04/new-yorks-gazetteers-1800-1899/</nowiki></ref>  The first two (1813 and 1824) were compiled by the writer and inventor [[Horatio Gates Spafford, Sr.|Horatio Gates Spafford]],<ref>Spafford, H.G. ''A Gazetteer of the State of New York ...'' Albany, N.Y.: B. D. Packard, 1824.  Archived and available online at: <nowiki>https://archive.org/details/gazetteerofstate00spaf/page/30/mode/2up</nowiki>  </ref> father of lawyer and poet [[Horatio Spafford|Horatio Gates Spafford]] (jr.) For John Homer French’s gazetteer (1860), he extensively re-surveyed the entire state, to improve the accuracy of his maps and geographic descriptions.<ref>French, J.H. ''Gazetteer of the State of New York ...'' Syracuse, N.Y.: R.P. Smith, 1860.  Archived and available online at: <nowiki>https://archive.org/details/gazetteerofstate04fren/page/n11/mode/2up</nowiki></ref> [[Franklin B. Hough]], a statistician who later gained renown in forestry, published his own gazetteer in 1872.<ref>Hough, F.B. ''Gazetteer of the State of New York ...'' Albany, N.Y.: Andrew Boyd, 1872.  Archived and available online at: <nowiki>https://archive.org/details/gazetteerofstate00houg/</nowiki></ref>  

===East Asia===

====China====
[[File:Gazetteer of Nanjing, 1624.jpg|thumb|right|upright|"Jinling Tuyong" ('[[Nanjing|Gazetteer of Jinling]]'), a [[Ming dynasty]] gazetteer printed in 1624 with 40 different [[woodblock printing|woodblock printed]] scenes of 17th-century [[Nanjing]]]]
[[File:Huijiangzhi (Gazetteer of the Muslim Regions), 1772..jpg|thumb|right|upright|"Huijiangzhi" ('[[History of Xinjiang#Qing dynasty|Gazetteer of the Muslim Regions]]'), a Chinese [[Qing dynasty]] illustration of a Muslim [[akhoond]] (Chinese: ''ahong'') from 1772. In 1755, the [[Qianlong Emperor]] sent an army to put down a [[Khoja]] rebellion in [[Kashgar]]. Several officers from that campaign aided in the compilation of this gazetteer.]]
[[File:Map of Fengshan County, Taiwan Prefectural Gazetteer, 1696.jpg|thumb|right|Map of the Fengshan County of "[[Taiwan]] Prefectural Gazetteer", published in 1696 during the [[Kangxi Emperor]]'s reign in the [[Qing dynasty]]]]
In [[Han dynasty]] (202&nbsp;BC&nbsp;– 220 AD) [[China]], the ''[[Yuejue Shu]]'' (越絕書) written in 52&nbsp;AD is considered by modern [[Sinology|sinologists]] and historians to be the prototype of the gazetteer ([[Mandarin Chinese|Chinese]]: ''difangzhi''), as it contained essays on a wide variety of subjects including changes in territorial division, the founding of cities, local products, and customs.<ref name="hargett 1996 406">Hargett (1996), 406.</ref> However, the first gazetteer proper is considered to be the [[Chronicles of Huayang]] by [[Chang Qu]] 常璩. There are over 8,000 gazetteers of pre-modern China that have survived.<ref name="hargett 1996 405">Hargett (1996), 405.</ref><ref name="thogersen clausen 162">Thogersen & Clausen, 162.</ref><ref>Bol, 37–38.</ref> Gazetteers became more common in the [[Song dynasty]] (960–1279), yet the bulk of surviving gazetteers were written during the [[Ming dynasty]] (1368–1644) and [[Qing dynasty]] (1644–1912).<ref name="hargett 1996 405"/> Modern scholar Liu Weiyi notes that just under 400 gazetteers were compiled in the era between the [[End of the Han dynasty|fall of the Han dynasty]] in 220 and the [[Tang dynasty]] (618–907).<ref name="hargett 1996 407">Hargett (1996), 407.</ref> Gazetteers from this era focused on boundaries and territory, place names, mountains and rivers, ancient sites, local products, local [[Chinese mythology|myths and legends]], customs, [[botany]], [[topography]], and locations of palaces, streets, temples, etc.<ref name="hargett 1996 408">Hargett (1996), 408.</ref> By the Tang dynasty the gazetteer became much more geographically specific, with a broad amount of content arranged topically; for example, there would be individual sections devoted to local astronomy, schools, dikes, canals, post stations, altars, local deities, temples, tombs, etc.<ref name="hargett 1996 411">Hargett (1996), 411.</ref> By the Song dynasty it became more common for gazetteers to provide biographies of local celebrities, accounts of elite local families, bibliographies, and literary anthologies of poems and essays dedicated to famous local spots.<ref name="hargett 1996 407"/><ref>Bol, 41.</ref> Song gazetteers also made lists and descriptions of city walls, gate names, wards and markets, districts, population size, and residences of former [[Prefecture (China)|prefects]].<ref>Hargett (1996), 414.</ref>

In 610 after the [[Sui dynasty]] (581–618) united a politically divided China, [[Emperor Yang of Sui]] had all the empire's commanderies prepare gazetteers called '[[History of cartography#China|maps and treatises]]' (Chinese: ''tujing'') so that a vast amount of updated textual and visual information on local roads, rivers, canals, and landmarks could be utilized by the central government to maintain control and provide better security.<ref name="hargett 1996 409 410">Hargett (1996), 409–410.</ref><ref name="needham volume 3 518">Needham, Volume 3, 518.</ref> Although the [[History of cartography#China|earliest extant Chinese maps]] date to the 4th century BC,<ref name="hsu 90">Hsu, 90.</ref> and ''tujing'' since the [[Qin dynasty|Qin]] (221–206 BC) or Han dynasties, this was the first known instance in China when the textual information of ''tujing'' became the primary element over the drawn illustrations.<ref name="hargett 1996 409">Hargett (1996), 409.</ref> This Sui dynasty process of providing maps and visual aids in written gazetteers—as well as the submitting of gazetteers with illustrative maps by local administrations to the central government—was continued in every subsequent [[Dynasties in Chinese history|Chinese dynasty]].<ref name="hargett 1996 410">Hargett (1996), 410.</ref>

Historian James M. Hargett states that by the time of the Song dynasty, gazetteers became far more geared towards serving the current political, administrative, and military concerns than in gazetteers of previous eras, while there were many more gazetteers compiled on the local and national levels than in previous eras.<ref name="hargett 1996 412">Hargett (1996), 412.</ref> [[Emperor Taizu of Song]] ordered Lu Duosun and a team of cartographers and scholars in 971 to initiate the compilation of a huge atlas and nationwide gazetteer that covered the whole of [[China proper]],<ref name="needham volume 3 518"/> which comprised approximately 1,200 [[Counties of the People's Republic of China#History|counties]] and 300 [[Prefecture (China)|prefectures]].<ref name="bol 44">Bol, 44.</ref> This project was completed in 1010 by a team of scholars under Song Zhun, who presented it in 1,566 chapters to the throne of [[Emperor Zhenzong of Song|Emperor Zhenzong]].<ref name="needham volume 3 518"/> This Sui dynasty process of infrequently collecting ''tujing'' or "map guides" continued, but it would be enhanced by the matured literary genre of ''fangzhi'' or "treatise on a place" of the Song dynasty.<ref name="bol 44"/> Although Zheng Qiao of the 12th century did not notice the ''fangzhi'' while writing his encyclopedic ''Tongzhi'' including monographs to geography and cities, others such as the bibliographer Chen Zhensun of the 13th century were listing gazetteers instead of the map guides in their works.<ref name="bol 44"/> The main differences between the ''fangzhi'' and the ''tujing'' was that the former was a product of "local initiative, not a central command" according to Peter K. Bol, and were usually ten, twenty, or even fifty chapters in length compared to the average four chapters for map guides.<ref name="bol 46">Bol, 46.</ref> Furthermore, the ''fangzhi'' were almost always [[History of typography in East Asia|printed]] because they were intended for a large reading audience, whereas ''tujing'' were exclusive records read by the local officials who drafted them and the central government officials who collected them.<ref name="bol 46"/> Although most Song gazetteers credited local officials as the authors, already in the Song there were bibliographers who noted that non-official literati were asked to compose these works or did so on their own behalf.<ref>Bol, 47.</ref> By the 16th century—during the Ming dynasty—local gazetteers were commonly composed due to local decision-making rather than a central government mandate.<ref name="bol 38">Bol, 38.</ref> Historian Peter K. Bol states that local gazetteers composed in this manner were the result of increased domestic and international trade that facilitated greater local wealth throughout China.<ref name="bol 38"/> Historian [[Richard Britnell|R.&nbsp;H. Britnell]] writes of gazetteers in Ming China, "by the sixteenth century, for a [[Counties of the People's Republic of China#History|county]] or [[Chinese Buddhism|monastery]] not to have a gazetteer was regarded as evidence that the place was inconsequential".<ref>Britnell, 237.</ref>

While working in the [[Three Departments and Six Ministries|Department of Arms]], the Tang dynasty cartographer [[Jia Dan]] (730–805) and his colleagues would [[Foreign relations of Imperial China|acquire information from foreign envoys]] about their respective homelands, and from these interrogations would produce maps supplemented by textual information.<ref name="schafer 26 27">Schafer, 26–27.</ref> Even within China, [[Ethnography|ethnographic]] information on [[Ethnic minorities in China|ethnic minorities]] of non-[[Han Chinese|Han]] peoples were often described in the local histories and gazetteers of provinces such as [[Guizhou]] during the Ming and Qing dynasties.<ref name="hostetler 633">Hostetler, 633.</ref> As the Qing dynasty pushed further with its troops and government authorities into areas of Guizhou that were uninhabited and not administered by the Qing government, the official gazetteers of the region would be revised to include the newly drawn-up districts and non-Han ethnic groups (mostly [[Miao people]]s) therein.<ref name="hostetler 633"/> While the late Ming dynasty officials who compiled the information on the ethnic groups of Guizhou offered scanty details about them in their gazetteers (perhaps due to their lack of contact with these peoples), the later Qing dynasty gazetteers often provided a much more comprehensive analysis.<ref name="hostetler 634">Hostetler, 634.</ref> By 1673 the Guizhou gazetteers featured different written entries for the various Miao peoples of the region.<ref name="hostetler 634"/> Historian Laura Holsteter writes on the [[Woodblock printing|woodblock print illustrations]] of Miao peoples in the Guizhou gazeteer, stating "the 1692 version of the [[Kangxi Emperor|Kangxi era]] gazetteer show a refinement in the quality of the illustrations by comparison to 1673".<ref>Hostetler, 637–638.</ref>

Historian [[Timothy Brook (historian)|Timothy Brook]] states that Ming dynasty gazetteers demonstrate a shift in the attitudes of [[Gentry (China)|Chinese gentry]] towards the traditionally lower [[Four occupations|merchant class]].<ref name="brook numerous pages"/> As time went on, the gentry solicited funds from merchants to build and repair schools, print scholarly books, build [[Chinese pagoda]]s on [[geomancy|auspicious sites]], and other things that were needed by the gentry and [[Scholar-bureaucrats|scholar-officials]] in order to succeed.<ref name="brook numerous pages">Brook, 6–7, 73, 90–93, 129–130, 151.</ref> Hence, the gentry figures composing the gazetteers in the latter half of the Ming period spoke favorably of merchants, whereas before they were rarely mentioned.<ref name="brook numerous pages"/> Brook and other modern sinologist historians also examine and consult the local Ming gazetteers to compare population info with the contemporary central government records, which often provided dubious population figures that did not reflect the actually larger population size of China during the time.<ref name="brook 28 94 96 267">Brook, 28, 94–96, 267.</ref>

Although better known for his work on the ''[[Gujin Tushu Jicheng]]'' encyclopedia, the early-to-mid Qing scholar [[Jiang Tingxi]] aided other scholars in the compilation of the "Daqing Yitongzhi" ('Gazetteer of the Qing Empire').<ref name="fairbank teng 211">Fairbank & Teng, 211.</ref> This was provided with a preface in 1744 (more than a decade after Jiang's death), revised in 1764, and reprinted in 1849.<ref name="fairbank teng 211"/>

The [[Jesuit China missions|Italian Jesuit]] [[Matteo Ricci]] created the first comprehensive world map in the [[Chinese language]] in the early 17th century,<ref name="wong 44">Wong, 44.</ref> while comprehensive world gazetteers were later translated into Chinese by Europeans. The [[Protestant missions in China 1807–1953|Christian missionary]] William Muirhead (1822–1900), who lived in [[Shanghai]] during the late Qing period, published the gazetteer "Dili quanzhi", which was reprinted in Japan in 1859.<ref name="masuda 18"/> Divided into fifteen volumes, this work covered Europe, Asia, Africa, and the [[List of archipelagos#Pacific Ocean|Pacific Ocean Archipelagos]], and was sub-divided further into sections on geography, topography, water masses, atmosphere, biology, anthropology, and historical geography.<ref name="masuda 18 19">Masuda, 18–19.</ref> Chinese maritime trade gazetteers mentioned a slew of different countries that came to trade in China, such as United States vessels docking at [[Guangzhou|Canton]] in the "Yuehaiguanzhi" ('Gazetteer of the Maritime Customs of Guangdong') published in 1839 (reprinted in 1935).<ref name="fairbank teng 215">Fairbank & Teng, 215.</ref> The Chinese language gazetteer ''[[Haiguo Tuzhi]]'' ('Illustrated Gazetteer of the Sea Kingdoms') by [[Wei Yuan]] in 1844 (with material influenced by the "Sizhou zhi" of [[Lin Zexu]])<ref name="masuda 32">Masuda, 32.</ref> was printed in Japan two decades later 1854.<ref name="masuda 23 24">Masuda, 23–24.</ref> This work was popular in Japan not for its geographical knowledge, but for its analysis of potential defensive military strategy in the face of European imperialism and the Qing's recent defeat in the [[First Opium War]] due to European artillery and gunboats.<ref name="masuda 23 24"/>

Continuing an old tradition of ''fangzhi'', the [[Republic of China (1912–1949)|Republic of China]] had gazetteers composed and created national standards for them in 1929, updating these in 1946.<ref name="vermeer 440">Vermeer 440.</ref> The printing of gazetteers was revived in 1956 under [[Mao Zedong]] and again in the 1980s, after the reforms of the [[Deng Xiaoping|Deng era]] to replace the [[people's communes]] with traditional [[Township (People's Republic of China)|townships]].<ref name="thogersen clausen 161 162">Thogersen & Clausen, 161–162.</ref> The ''difangzhi'' effort under Mao yielded little results (only 10 of the 250 designated counties ended up publishing a gazetteer), while the writing of ''difangzhi'' was interrupted during the [[Cultural Revolution]] (1966–1976), trumped by the village and family histories which were more appropriate for the theme of [[class struggle]].<ref name="thogersen clausen 163">Thogersen & Clausen, 163.</ref><ref>Vermeer, 440–443.</ref> A Li Baiyu of [[Shanxi]] forwarded a letter to the [[Propaganda Department of the Communist Party of China Central Committee|CCP Propaganda Department]] on May 1, 1979, which urged for the revival of ''difangzhi''.<ref name="thogersen clausen 163"/> This proposal was sponsored by [[Hu Yaobang]] in June 1979 while [[Hu Qiaomu]] of the CCP Politburo lent his support for the idea in April 1980.<ref name="thogersen clausen 163"/> The first issue of a modern national journal of ''difangzhi'' was issued by January 1981.<ref name="thogersen clausen 163"/>

====Korea====
In [[Korea]], scholars based their gazetteers largely on the Chinese model.<ref name="mccune 326">McCune, 326.</ref> Like Chinese gazetteers, there were national, provincial, and local prefecture Korean gazetteers which featured geographic information, demographic data, locations of bridges, schools, temples, tombs, fortresses, pavilions, and other landmarks, cultural customs, local products, resident clan names, and short biographies on well-known people.<ref name="provine 8">Provine, 8.</ref><ref name="lewis 225 226">Lewis, 225–226.</ref><ref name="pratt rutt 423"/> In an example of the latter, the 1530 edition of "[[Sinjŭng Tongguk yŏji sŭngnam]]" ('Revised Augmented Survey of the Geography of Korea') gave a brief statement about Pak Yŏn (1378–1458), noting his successful career in the [[civil service]], his exceptional filiality, his brilliance in [[music theory]], and his praisable efforts in systematizing ritual music for [[Sejong the Great of Joseon|Sejong's court]].<ref name="provine 8"/> King Sejong established the [[Joseon]] dynasty's first national gazetteer in 1432, called the "Sinch'an p'aldo" ('Newly Compiled Geographic Treatise on the Eight Circuits').<ref name="lewis 225">Lewis, 225.</ref> With additional material and correction of mistakes, the title of this gazetteer was revised in 1454 as the "Sejong Sillok chiriji" ('King Sejong's Treatise on Geography'), updated in 1531 under the title "Sinjŭng tongguk yŏji sŭngnam",<ref name="lewis 225"/> and enlarged in 1612.<ref name="pratt rutt 423">Pratt & Rutt, 423.</ref> The Joseon Koreans also created international gazetteers. The "Yojisongnam" gazetteer compiled from 1451 to 1500 provides a small description for 369 different foreign countries known to Joseon Korea in the 15th century.<ref name="mccune 326"/>

====Japan====
In [[Japan]], there were also local gazetteers in pre-modern times, called {{Lang|ja-latn|[[fudoki]]}}.<ref name="miller 279">Miller, 279.</ref> Japanese gazetteers preserved historical and legendary accounts of various regions. For example, the [[Nara period|Nara-period]] (710–794) provincial gazetteer ''Harima no kuni fūdoki'' of [[Harima Province]] provides a story of an alleged visit by [[Emperor Ōjin]] in the 3rd century while on an imperial hunting expedition.<ref name="taryō">Taryō, 178.</ref> Local Japanese gazetteers could also be found in later periods such as the [[Edo period]].<ref name="levine 78">Levine, 78.</ref> Gazetteers were often composed by the request of wealthy patrons; for example, six scholars in the service of the ''[[daimyō]]'' of the [[Ikeda clan|Ikeda]] household published the ''Biyō kokushi'' gazetteer for several counties in 1737.<ref name="hall 211">Hall, 211.</ref> World gazetteers were written by the Japanese in the 19th century, such as the ''Kon'yo zushiki'' ("Annotated Maps of the World") published by Mitsukuri Shōgo in 1845, the ''Hakkō tsūshi'' ("Comprehensive Gazetteer of the Entire World") by Mitsukuri Genpo in 1856, and the ''Bankoku zushi'' ("Illustrated Gazetteer of the Nations of the World"), which was written by an Englishman named Colton, translated by Sawa Ginjirō, and printed by Tezuka Ritsu in 1862.<ref name="masuda 18">Masuda, 18.</ref> Despite the ambitious title, the work by Genpo only covered ''Yōroppa bu'' ("Section on Europe") while the planned section for Asia was not published.<ref name="masuda 18"/> In 1979 the 50 volume gazeteer ''Nihon rekishi chimei taikei'' ("Japanese Historical Place Names") series was launched<ref>Yasuko Makino,[https://www.oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/oi/authority.20110803095928491 "Heibonsha" (entry)], ''The Oxford Companion to the Book'', oxfordreference.com. Retrieved 28 June 2022.</ref> and it is currently also available online with "200,000 headings with detailed explanations of [each] place name".<ref>[https://lib.ku.edu/database/nihon-rekishi-chimei-taikei-ribenlishidemingdaxi-japanese-historical-place-names Nihon rekishi chimei taikei (日本歴史地名大系) = Japanese Historical Place Names], ku.edu. Retrieved 28 June 2022.</ref>

===South Asia===
In pre-modern [[India]], local gazetteers were written. For example, [[Muhnot Nainsi]] wrote a gazetteer ([[Nainsi ri Khyat]] and Marwar rai Pargana ri Vigat) for the [[Marwar]] region in the 17th century.<ref name="gole 102">Gole, 102.</ref> B.&nbsp;S. Baliga writes that the history of the gazetteer in [[Tamil Nadu]] can be traced back to the classical corpus of [[Sangam literature]], dated 200&nbsp;BC to 300&nbsp;AD.<ref name="baliga 255">Baliga, 255.</ref> [[Abu'l-Fazl ibn Mubarak]], the [[vizier]] to [[Akbar the Great]] of the [[Mughal Empire]], wrote the ''[[Ain-e-Akbari]]'', which included a gazetteer with valuable information on India's population in the 16th century.<ref name="floor clawson 347 348">Floor & Clawson, 347–348.</ref>

===Muslim world===
The pre-modern [[Islamic world]] produced gazetteers. Cartographers of the [[Safavid dynasty]] of [[Iran]] made gazetteers of local areas.<ref>King, 79.</ref>