Alexander Buchan’s meteorological maps of Scotland

Chris Fleet FRSGS, Map Curator, National Library of Scotland

Meteorology is inherently geographic, and it has been closely integrated with maps since it emerged as an applied science in the 19th century. Maps are essential for understanding and forecasting the weather, and they have continued to shape the growth and development of the discipline. The basic choropleth map – grouping and often tinting areas with a similar variable, such as rainfall or temperature – is ubiquitous and well-known today, thanks to the mass of easily available data and computer-based tools including GIS. It’s therefore easy to overlook how innovative these kinds of maps were in the 19th century, and how pioneering the work of Alexander Buchan was in both gathering meteorological data and presenting it.

Alexander Buchan was secretary of the Scottish Meteorological Society from 1860–1907, and amongst many other things, he coordinated the recording of weather data from the network of climatological stations across Scotland. These two maps synthesize the results of these observations relating to rainfall and temperature in Scotland over 25 years from 1866 to 1890. Buchan also pioneered the use of monthly weather maps to show seasonal variations over the year, which, as for Scotland, were much more distinctive and useful than annual averages. These two maps were published in John George Bartholomew’s magnificent Survey Atlas of Scotland (1895), Scotland’s landmark national atlas of the late 19th century. This brought together the work of other leading experts in the physical, geological and natural sciences, and it is fitting that Buchan’s meteorological work was also included.