Abstract
The chapter describes history of one of the most important map collections in Europe. It is inseparably linked with Geographical Institute and prof.
V. Švambera. It was founded in 1891.
The State Map Collection (SMC) was at the initiative of V.Švambera and his colleagues established on the 29th of November 1920. Interesting facsimile were published in the edition of old maps of the Czech territory Monumenta Cartographica Bohemiae.
After World War II it obtained a number of confiscated materials from the German university and from castle libraries, map collection of the National Museum and a part of the collection of the University Library. SMC had been led by K.
Kuchař since 1945. It published professional periodical Cartographic overview within the years 1946-1960.
The SMC was incorporated into Czechoslovak Academy of Science as a Cabinet for Cartography in 1953, which was affiliated with the Cabinet for Morphology of Geographical Institute in Brno in 1963. Many interesting personalities connected with historical cartography grew up in the Collection: O.
Kudrnovská, A. Dvořáčková, L.
Mucha, J. Mojdl or I.
Kupčík. Geographical Institute was closed down on the 30th of April 1993 and the Map Collection was returned to the Charles University.
Col.Doc. Dalibor Moravec led the Collection in the years 1993-2003.
E. Novotná was appointed the director in 2010.
She initiated projects associated with the revitalization of the Collection. An extensive reconstruction was carried out with the support of Geographical Section and the Faculty of Science of the Charles University.
Within the TEMAP project of the Ministry of Culture Czech Republic there were 58,000 documents catalogued, 90,000 units written down and 65,000 maps made available. The Map Collection owns 130,000 map sheets, 2,000 atlases and 85 globes.
Old prints, manuscripts and unique objects form about half of the collection.