This volume is a slice of the famous eleventh edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica, published in 1911 and long regarded as a high point of the encyclopedic tradition. Covering entries alphabetically from “Map” to “Mars,” it gathers scholarly articles by various contributors on geography, history, science, biography, and the arts.
The eleventh edition is prized for the literary quality and breadth of its articles, written by experts of the Edwardian era, though its perspectives reflect the assumptions of its time. This portion appears in the present collection for its entries touching on places, monuments, and design. Read it as a window onto early-twentieth-century scholarship and the encyclopedic ambition to compress all knowledge between covers.