When William of Wykeham drew up his rules for the Fellows and Scholars of New College, Oxford, he directed them in the long winter evenings to occupy themselves with "singing, or reciting poetry, or with the chronicles of the different kingdoms, or with the _wonders of the world_." Hence almost all mediaeval maps are filled up with pictures of these wonders, which were the more necessary as so few people could read.

A curious survival of this custom lasted on in map-drawing almost to the beginning of this century, when the spare places in the ocean were adorned with pictures of sailing ships or spouting sea monsters.
When men desired to travel, they did not use such maps as these, but rather itineraries, or road-books, which did not profess to give the shape of the countries through which a traveller would pass, but only indicated the chief towns on the most-frequented roads.

This information was really derived from classical times, for the Roman emperors from time to time directed such road-books to be drawn up, and there still remains an almost complete itinerary of the Empire, known as the Peutinger Table, from the name of the German merchant who first drew the attention of the learned world to it.

A condensed reproduction is given on the following page, from which it will be seen that no attempt is made to give anything more than the roads and towns.

Unfortunately, the first section of the table, which started from Britain, has been mutilated, and we only get the Kentish coast.