Regular meetings of the Washington Map Society are held in the Reading Room, Geography and Map Division, B level, Library of Congress, Madison Building, 101 Independence Ave., S.E., Washington, DC. The Library is one block from METRO's Capitol South Station, on the Blue and Orange lines. To inquire about the following events or to offer meeting suggestions, please contact the chairman of the WMS Program Committee, Howard Lange, tel. 703-532-1605 or email [log in to unmask] <mailto:[log in to unmask]>. Following is information on March and April meetings. On Thursday, March 13, 2008, at 7:00 p.m., Dr. Richard Betz and Penelope Betz will present The Cartobibliographic Process used for The Mapping of Africa: Sebastian Münster's 1540 Map of Africa as a Case Study. Dr. Betz has recently written The Mapping of Africa: A Cartobibliography of Printed Maps of the African Continent to 1700. His book is the first major undertaking to systematically categorize and describe all printed maps of the African continent to 1700, and Dr. Betz will describe the process of research and compilation. The Betz's will illustrate with a case study: Sebastian Münster's double-page map of Africa, which is present in all four editions of his Geographia from 1540 to 1552, and in all twenty-nine editions of his Cosmographia from 1544 to 1578. They discovered no less than 15 variants of the map, and they will use this example to discuss the major elements of a cartographic entry. Dr. Betz has offered to date any examples of Münster's Africa that members bring to the meeting. Richard and Penelope Betz have had a lifelong attraction to Africa. They lived on the continent for twelve years while Richard was engaged in promoting economic development. His doctoral work concerned rural enterprise in Africa. Penelope taught art and English in various international and American schools and has written and edited textbooks and training materials. On Thursday, April 17, 2008, at 7:00 pm, Dr. Francesca Fiorani will address the Society on The Places of Renaissance Mapping. Renaissance maps combined different systems of representation, different modes of description and different signs, commingling features of medieval cartography with the quintessential feature of modern mapping, the grid. How shall we account for the ways in which places were represented in European maps? Dr. Fiorani will discuss an approach to Renaissance maps that takes into account simultaneously their spatial and cultural context. She believes that the meanings of cartographic artifacts -from individual prints to painted galleries and atlases- are best understood by combining an investigation of the maps themselves and the spaces that contain them with an analysis of mapping in relation to other forms of knowledge and representation. Francesca Fiorani received her Ph.D. in Renaissance Art from the University of Rome "La Sapienza" and joined the University of Virginia in 1995. She has written extensively on Leonardo da Vinci, Renaissance cartography and mapping, scientific culture in Renaissance courts, and artistic theory. Her recent book The Marvel of Maps. Art, Cartography and Politics in Renaissance Italy, focuses on two compelling map murals of the Renaissance - the Guardaroba Nuova of the Palazzo Vecchio, Florence, and the Gallery of Maps in the Vatican. Regards, Howard Lange For additional information about the Washington Map Society or its programs, please visit us on the web at www.mashmap.org <http://www.mashmap.org>.