Hundreds of thousands of topographical views, the most comprehensive and important collection in Britain.
British Library Map Library K.Top. LXXXV. 61a. Vue du Château de Chillon sur le Lac de Genève au Canton de Berne. Hand coloured etching by Christian von Mechel after Hubert, c.1775. Copyright © The British Library Board
The collections have come together over two and a half centuries from many different sources, and have been catalogued at various times in different ways. The cataloguing systems employed are generally not designed to describe images and illustrations, and at the moment it is necessary to look in a number of locations to discover the Library's unrivalled collection of topographical views.
The British Library's topographical collections: an overview
For a guide to researching topographical views of places in the British Isles, see
British Topographical Views: an annotated bibliography of bibliographies. London: British Library, 2007.
