We are delighted to announce the publication of An Historical Map of Bath, Medieval, Stuart and Georgian City, produced in association with the History of Bath Research Group.
The map plots Bath’s development on a base map of 1904, showing how the Roman, medieval and Stuart settlements centred within the same boundaries, around the hot springs, and how the 18th-century developments spread up the hill and across the river.
Georgian Bath is familiar to many who have never visited the city, but have walked its streets in imagination with Catherine Morland, Anne Elliot, and other heroines and heroes. The map will aid such imaginary perambulations, and help to understand the nuances of fashion and status according to location. By dating different phases of development it also reminds us how new Bath was in the 1790s and early 1800s, and how fresh and brilliant it must have appeared, with new-cut stone as yet undimmed by smoke and weather.
The reverse of the map outlines Bath’s development and important themes and events in its history, with brief accounts of major buildings and features keyed to the map. It includes a detailed reconstruction of Bath c. 1641, based on a based on contemporary historical sources and research by the History of Bath Research Group and the late Mike Chapman. The publication is illustrated with numerous paintings and prints from the collections of the Victoria Art Gallery.
The map is now available from bookshops, and to order from our website shop, here.