Ammassalik wooden maps are carved, tactile maps of the

Greenland Greenland is an autonomous territory in the Danish Realm, Kingdom of Denmark. It is by far the largest geographically of three constituent parts of the kingdom; the other two are metropolitan Denmark and the Faroe Islands. Citizens of Greenlan ...

ic coastlines. In the 1880s, Gustav Holm led an expedition to the Ammassalik coast of eastern

, where he met several Tunumiit, or Eastern Greenland

Inuit Inuit (singular: Inuk) are a group of culturally and historically similar Indigenous peoples traditionally inhabiting the Arctic and Subarctic regions of North America and Russia, including Greenland, Labrador, Quebec, Nunavut, the Northwe ...

communities, who had had no prior direct contact with Europeans. He returned to Denmark with a set of three-dimensional wooden maps of the coast around , carved by a native of Umivik named Kunit.

History

Kunit approached Holm on February 8, 1885, and sold the maps representing the coast from Sermiligak to Kangerdlugsuatsiak. Kunit returned on March 21 with another piece representing the peninsula between Sermiligak and Kangerdluarsikajik. Upon Holm's return, the maps were deposited along with the rest of the collection at the

National Museum of Denmark The National Museum of Denmark (Nationalmuseet) in Copenhagen is Denmark, Denmark's largest museum of cultural history, comprising the histories of Danish and foreign cultures, alike. The museum's main building is located a short distance from S ...

Copenhagen Copenhagen ( ) is the capital and most populous city of Denmark, with a population of 1.4 million in the Urban area of Copenhagen, urban area. The city is situated on the islands of Zealand and Amager, separated from Malmö, Sweden, by the ...

. As of 1948 the maps were still in Copenhagen; copies were deposited in the Musée d'Ethnographie du Trocadéro in

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...

. At some point the maps were transferred to the Greenland National Museum in

Nuuk Nuuk (; , formerly ) is the capital and most populous city of Greenland, an autonomous territory in the Kingdom of Denmark. Nuuk is the seat of government and the territory's largest cultural and economic center. It is also the seat of gove ...

, which was established in the mid-1960s. write that the "only other known example" of such a map is a specimen at the

Michigan State University Museum The Michigan State University Museum most commonly referred to as the ''MSU Museum'' is Michigan State University's oldest museum formed in 1857. It is the state of Michigan's first Smithsonian Affiliate. It was formed to support the work of the ...

— item 896.7, 62154 — which is probably a copy of Kunit's work. In 2000,

Post Greenland Tusass (formerly Tele-Post) is a Greenlandic postal and telecommunications company dating back to 1879. Tusass is the largest telecommunications company in Greenland. The company's headquarters are located in Nuuk. The company is divided into th ...

issued a stamp designed by Anne-Birthe Hove featuring the coastal map, as part of its "Greenland's Cultural Heritage" series. The Greenland National Museum loaned out the maps for a 2007-8 exhibition at the

Field Museum of Natural History The Field Museum of Natural History (FMNH), also known as The Field Museum, is a natural history museum in Chicago, Illinois, and is one of the largest such museums in the world. The museum is popular for the size and quality of its educationa ...

Chicago Chicago is the List of municipalities in Illinois, most populous city in the U.S. state of Illinois and in the Midwestern United States. With a population of 2,746,388, as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, it is the List of Unite ...

entitled ''Maps: Finding Our Place in the World'', which also traveled to the

Walters Art Museum The Walters Art Museum is a public art museum located in the Mount Vernon, Baltimore, Mount Vernon neighborhood of Baltimore, Maryland. Founded and opened in 1934, it holds collections from the mid-19th century that were amassed substantially ...

Baltimore Baltimore is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Maryland. With a population of 585,708 at the 2020 census and estimated at 568,271 in 2024, it is the 30th-most populous U.S. city. The Baltimore metropolitan area is the 20th-large ...

Features

Related maps

Marshall Islands stick chart Stick charts were made and used by the Marshallese people, Marshallese to navigate the Pacific Ocean by canoe off the coast of the Marshall Islands. The charts represented major swell (ocean), ocean swell patterns and the ways the islands disru ...

* Straight-line diagram

Notes

References

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History

Features

Related maps

Notes

References

Further reading