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Mercator|mɜːˈkeɪtə(r)|
Also mercator.
[L., = ‘merchant’.]
a. The name of Gerhardus Mercator (= L. equivalent of Gerhard Kremer) (1512–94), Flemish cartographer, used attrib. and in the possessive with reference to the orthomorphic cylindrical map projection first used by him in 1568, in which meridians are represented by equidistant straight lines at right angles to the equator and any course that follows a constant compass bearing is represented by a straight line.
1669Mercator's projection [see projection n. 7 b]. a1877Knight Dict. Mech. II. 1419/2 Mercator-chart, a mode of projection invented by Gerald Mercator, in which the meridians and parallels are straight and parallel lines. 1883Encycl. Brit. XV. 520/2 By 1601 Mercator's projection was in use for all sea charts. 1908G. R. Putnam Naut. Charts 9 The Arcano del Mare, 1646, was the first marine atlas in which all the maps were drawn on the mercator projection. 1912A. R. Hinks Map Projections iii. 29 The great distortion in the north and south makes Mercator's projection altogether unsuitable for a land map. 1938L. M. Milne-Thomson Theoret. Hydrodynamics v. 138 An illustration of conformal mapping is afforded by an ordinary map on Mercator's projection. 1960C. Eckart Hydrodynamics of Oceans & Atmospheres 280 The vertical co-ordinate, µ, on a Mercator chart of the Sphere is defined by dϕ = cosϕdµ.
b. absol. (A map drawn on) Mercator's projection.
1879Encycl. Brit. X. 208/2 The meridian Mercator drawn as described in the last paragraph..may be made to serve the important purpose of enabling one to trace on the ordinary Mercator's chart the track of a great circle joining any two places. 1953A. H. Robinson Elem. Cartogr. iii. 43/1 The poles cannot be represented for they are ‘at’ infinity on the conventional Mercator. |