Mapping the Great Game: Explorers, Spies and Maps in 19th-Century Asia

I enjoyed and was informed by Peter Hopkirk's "The Great Game", but was annoyed by it's poor maps. So when I saw a book with "mapping" in the title, I thought it would fill in some gaps- perhaps "before and after" maps showing what the extraordinary efforts of the pundits etc achieved. I was disappointed. It adds little to the story and appears to me to be a superior student's summary of other works available on Amazon. The book contains few if any maps that illustrate the Great Game.

I selected this book as a present for my partner to go with another history book on a similar topic. I thought it would be full of maps to go alongside the other book - but alas, there only seem to be two maps in the whole book. The book may be good, but the title is definitely misleading!

Book is pristine condition.

A well written and enjoyable book describing the East India Company’s 19th century efforts to map the Indian subcontinent, specifically Himalayan mountain passes that might allow viable access routes for Imperial Russia forces on their southward expansion through Central Asia and beyond, The Great Game. Dean takes the reader through 40 years of effort by William Lambton and Sir George Everest, superintendents of the Great Trigonometrical Survey of the subcontinent from Cape Comorin at the southern tip to the high Himalaya, more than 2000 Km, enduring disease, bandits and tigers.A group of Survey of India officers trained a select group of natives, pundits, to map the trade routes and passes through the Himalaya to Central Asia. Traveling on foot for months with meager resources, Dean vividly describes their clandestine travels to map this dangerous and remote area including Tibet and Turkestan in Central Asia Beyond.Dean is a gifted writer, economy of words and a smooth flow kept this reader anxious for the next chapter. Included maps allow the reader to follow the narrative and grasp the scale and enormity of this century long effort. I couldn’t put this book down and hope for more from Mr. Dean.Alan Volbrecht