Kain, Roger and William Ravenhill, ed. Historical Atlas of South-West England. Exeter: University of Exeter Press, 1999. xxiv, 564p., 395 maps, 150 illus., 24 col. ISBN 0-85989-434-7, £55.

This marvelous book (oversized and boxed) covers the Isles of Scilly and Cornwall and Devon, the two counties that cover the peninsula at the extreme southwest corner of England. The editors have brought together the contributions of 56 experts (nearly all academics), and cartographer Helen Jones has trans-formed their data into about 390 easy-to-read, black-and-white thematic maps. A small number of old maps and illustrations are found in a color section at the front of the book. Monochrome graphs, illustrations, and a few reproductions of old maps supplement the new thematic maps. The volume is divided into 65 chapters covering myriad topics that range in time from the neolithic age to the 1990s and topically from economic subjects like agriculture, industry, transportation and maritime affairs to religion, population, and town development. Each chapter concludes with suggestions for additional reading, and an extensive section of backnotes describes the sources used to compile the maps. Two flaws (which may have been forced by a need to economize) are the lack of an index and the placement of reference maps of the parishes and hundreds in the two counties on the end papers, where librarians often must affix labels. Special recognition is due to the Towry Law Charitable Trust, which donated a copy of the atlas to each secondary school in the region, and other contributors whose support enabled the publisher to keep the price well below $100.

John Long
The Newberry Library