Atlas is the term used to refer to collection of maps, printed in a set order: world map, maps of the con tinents, each followed by maps the several regions within that con tinent, and with an alphabetical gazetteer or list of place names giving coordinates for various places, rivers, regions etc. The first use of the term atlas dates back 1595 with the publication in Duis burg of the Atlas Sive Cosmo graphicae Meditationes de Fabri ca Mundi Et Fabricati Figura by Gerard Mercator (1512-94). It was named after King Atlas, a mythi cal King of Mauretania in Libya who was, according to legend, wise philosopher, mathematician and astronomer and who suppos edly made the first celestial globe However, the more widely known Atlas is a figure from Greek mythology. He is the son of the Ti tan Iapetus and Clymene (or Asia) and brother of Prometheus. Atlas was punished by Zeus and made bear the weight of the heavens and Earth on his back.
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