142
RONALD C. Y. NG
its appearance, two copies of this significant contribution to the geographical world were presented to the Society by J. L. Southey in 1868, but for a century the authorship and the identity of this 'Italian missionary of the Propaganda' remained unknown.
Considering the difficulties presented by the rugged terrain and the unsettled times under which the observations were made, the map has a remarkable degree of accuracy and contains a wealth of information. Although it cannot be ascertained whether Mgr. Volonteri had received any cartographic training, either before or after he entered the priesthood, the map displays no sign of amateurism and, indeed, it won several enviable awards in various European exhibitions, including the Milan Cartographic Exhibition of 1894, in the years immediately following its appearance. Other things apart, the fact that it is probably the first ever bilingual map of its kind must place it in a class of its own.
There are several features of the map that merit close attention. The longitudes shown are reasonably accurate, but the latitudes are some 2 minutes north of their true positions. Apparently Mgr. Volonteri did not make the actual measurements himself, but had copied the grid from a previously existing source. It would be an impossible task to determine which particular version he adopted but it is fairly certain that it had not originated from British sources, for an official map of Hong Kong Island published twenty years earlier by the Government had the longitudes and latitudes in their correct positions. Naval charts might well have been consulted in the process of plotting the coastline because of the inclusion on the map of the depths of water - information which would obviously be of little relevance to the priest who must have compiled the map for some utilitarian purposes. The quality of the coastline has a great variation in accuracy. In spite of the highly irregular coast due to submergence, Mirs Bay, Tolo Harbour, Tide Cove, Hebe Haven and the eastern approaches of Victoria Harbour are not only packed with sounding records but are also depicted accurately down to the uninhabited islets. On the other hand, for the remainder of the map, the accuracy of the coastline is most disappointing. There could be two possible explanations for this. It was either that coastal charting was still in progress and had not yet covered the western parts or that Fr. Volonteri might have improved on an outline from an earlier smaller-scale map for the areas with which he
142
RONALD C. Y, NG
its appearance, two copies of this significant contribution to the geographical world were presented to the Society by J. L. Southey in 1868, but for a century the authorship and the identity of this 'Italian missionary of the Propaganda' remained unknown.
Considering the difficulties presented by the rugged terrain and the unsettled times under which the observations were made, the map has a remarkable degree of accuracy and contains a wealth of information. Although it cannot be ascertained whether Mgr. Volonteri had received any cartographic training, either before or after he entered the priesthood, the map displays no sign of amateurism and, indeed, it won several enviable awards in various European exhibitions, including the Milan Cartographic Exhibition of 1894, in the years immediately following its ap- pearance. Other things apart, the fact that it is probably the first ever bilingual map of its kind must place it in a class of its own.
There are several features of the map that merit close atten- tion. The longitudes shown are reasonably accurate, but the latitudes are some 2 minutes north of their true positions. Ap- parently Mgr. Volonteri did not make the actual measurements himself, but had copied the grid from a previously existing source. It would be an impossible task to determine which particular version he adopted but it is fairly certain that it had not originated from British sources, for an official map of Hong Kong Island published twenty years earlier by the Government had the longi- tudes and latitudes in their correct positions. Naval charts might well have been consulted in the process of plotting the coastline because of the inclusion on the map of the depths of water- information which would obviously be of little relevance to the priest who must have compiled the map for some utilitarian pur- poses. The quality of the coastline has a great variation in ac- curacy. In spite of the highly irregular coast due to submergence, Mirs Bay, Tolo Harbour, Tide Cove, Hebe Haven and the eastern approaches of Victoria Harbour are not only packed with sound- ing records but are also depicted accurately down to the unin- habited islets. On the other hand, for the remainder of the map, the accuracy of the coastline is most disappointing. There could be two possible explanations for this. It was either that coastal charting was still in progress and had not yet covered the western parts or that Fr. Volonteri might have improved on an outline from an earlier smaller-scale map for the areas with which he
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