Innovation No. 26 of 77 in the book
The First Geological Map
The Turin Papyrus Map, charting gold-bearing quartz and greywacke quarries in the Eastern Desert
- When
- c. 1150 BCE
- Dynasty
- 20th Dynasty
- Era
- New Kingdom
The oldest surviving geological map in the world is Egyptian: the Turin Papyrus Map, drawn around 1150 BCE for a mining expedition under Ramesses IV.
It charts a stretch of the Eastern Desert with real precision — marking the roads, the hills, a gold-mining settlement, and different rock types in different colors.
It even distinguishes gold-bearing quartz from the surrounding stone. This isn’t decoration; it’s a working survey map, made to find and move valuable rock.
Geology’s first map was folded into a pharaoh’s mining kit.
The scroll is held at the Museo Egizio in Turin. It was found in the early nineteenth century in the ruins of the workers' village at Deir el-Medina and dates to the reign of Ramesses IV, around 1150 BCE. It charts a fifteen-kilometre stretch of the Wadi Hammamat, the desert valley linking the Nile to the Red Sea, with hieratic notes naming destinations and working out distances.
Frequently Asked Questions
How does the colour-coding work?
As a legend, much like a modern map. Gravel wadi paths are painted bright yellow, hills holding gold-bearing quartz veins a distinct pink, and areas rich in greywacke — the hard dark sandstone cut for royal sarcophagi — are marked separately again.
What was the map for?
A mining expedition. It is a working document, drawn to locate specific stone and gold and to move heavy loads back along a known route, not a decorative picture of the desert.