atlas

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   a bound collection of maps

   He traced the river's course across two pages of the worn atlas.

Simplified etymology

Atlas comes from the name of the Titan in Greek mythology who was condemned to bear the world on his shoulders. A book of maps acquired the name because early collections were illustrated with Atlas carrying the world, with the cartographer Gerardus Mercator probably first using the term this way in the late 16th century. The Atlas Mountains and the Atlantic Ocean also take their names from Atlas.

From the Titan Atlas of Greek mythology, who held up the heavens; the cartographic sense arises because 16th-century map collections (notably Mercator's) bore a depiction of Atlas bearing the globe. Greek Átlās is traditionally derived from a- (intensive) + tláō ('to bear, endure').

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External links

• Google Images
• Cambridge Dictionary
• Wiktionary