Geographical Sources
The geographical sources are a category of reference books that help in answering queries connected to places. They give information like description and location related to countries, states, regions, districts, cities, mountains, rivers, lakes and all places throughout the world. The geographical sources can be categorized into four categories:
- gazetteers
- guidebooks, handbooks
- maps and atlases
- a globe
A gazetteer provides historical, cultural, political, social, industrial, demographic and administrative details about a place. It gives geographic data and location as well by providing longitude and latitude.
A guidebook is a, handy book for travellers that gives information about a city, a region, a county, a religious place or about a building or a historical monument. These are usually meant for tourists and people who want to visit various places. The guide books usually provide all the information about routes, travel facilities, hotels to live in, cultural, religious aspects, social, eating places and shopping centre, and so on.
A map is a graphic presentation of a place normally drawn to scale and it provides location and direction which otherwise is difficult to define by written documents. An atlas is a collection of maps bound up in the form of a book. If the map is a graphic image of earth drawn to scale, on the other side a globe is a spherical representation of the earth's surface. It is a hollow ball of metal or plastic having the world map drawn on its surface.