History
Four Centuries of Mapping the Subterranean World
Boston Public Library's Leventhal Map Center is exhibiting maps of volcanoes, catacombs, mines, subways, sewage systems, and other underground cartography.
Boston Public Library
Art
How an Imaginary Island Stayed on Maps for Five Centuries
A tiny blot of a landmass off the western coast of Ireland is curiously labeled "Imaginary Isle of O Brazil" on cartographer Thomas Jefferys's 1768 "Chart of the Atlantic Ocean." A 21st-century viewer might wonder: why include a fictional island on a map of the known world?
News
Crimes of the Art
On this week’s art crime blotter: Ukrainian militias flood the market with stolen paintings, a museum security guard is sacked for on-the-job vandalism, and a British art forger does it for love.
News
Two Prints Go Missing at the Boston Public Library
When an employee at the Boston Public Library couldn't find a Rembrandt etching in its Special Collections archive on April 8, it probably didn't seem like too big a deal.