Long before the camera was invented, people recorded their travels by purchasing prints to remind them of a partricular country, city, building, or event. For over four hundred years, these period graphics chronicled the expanding universe in maps, city views, architecture, and native customs or costumes.

Beginning with the Gothic images of various cities of the world depicted in the Nuremberg Chronicle, people whose real world never exceeded the boundaries of their towns and fiefdoms suddenly had the added perspective of a world oceans away and totally foreign.Prints of this genre are known as topography and come in a wide varitey of subjects, sizes, styles, dates and prices.