Updated: 6 days ago
I went into a garden centre to buy my daughter some sweets after school and came out with around twenty photographs of a £650 picture I knew absolutely nothing about.
I was walking past the art section when I noticed this picture sitting on the floor. I couldn’t understand why something that interesting was down there, like it didn’t deserve much attention.
There were all these lines, numbers and measurements on it. None of it made much sense to me.
We didn’t have much time, so I quickly took some photographs, making sure to capture the title so I could look it up when I got home.
When I got home, I searched for the title.
It was from 1852.
There was also a name I hadn’t noticed before: John Emslie. He had drawn and engraved it, and it was published in London by James Reynolds.
I found a high-resolution copy of the original online. It was six feet long, but you could fold the whole thing down into a small case.
The framed one I’d seen in the garden centre was a reproduction.
The picture was a journey from the equator to the Arctic. As you move across it, the animals change, the plants change, it gets colder, and even the length of the day changes.
John Emslie, View of Nature in All Climates, 1852. David Rumsey Map Collection, David Rumsey Map Center, Stanford University Libraries.
But there were still all these numbers and lines I didn’t understand.
In the colder part of the picture, I noticed these numbers:
21 hours. 22 hours. 23 hours. 24 hours.
I had no idea what they meant.
Turns out they were hours of daylight, showing how long the Sun stays up.
In summer, the further north you go, the longer the days get. Eventually, the Sun doesn’t set at all.
That’s what the 24 meant.
There was also an education report from 1868 that listed the picture as something schools could use in classrooms, including a version mounted on a roller.
It feels crazy that something once used to teach children about the world is now sold as decoration in a garden centre.
A few days ago, I didn’t even know who John Emslie was.
Now I know why there was a 24 at the top of the Arctic.
And I know I don’t need to spend £650 if I ever decide I want one.
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