Day of Geodesy and Cartography Workers in Russia

The Day of Geodesy and Cartography Workers in Russia is celebrated annually on the second Sunday of March according to Presidential Decree No 1867 of November 11, 2000 Surveyors and cartographers are representatives of professions whose origins began long before the advent of our era And they appeared as a result of the formation of certain human activities The emergence of geodesy is correlated with the emergence of agriculture and the simultaneous need to resolve issues of dividing land, to determine the size, shape, and spatial position of plots For the first time, Aristotle included the concepts of “geodesy” (land division) and “geometry” (land surveying) in the book “Metaphysics” This happened in the 4th century BC It is obvious that geodetic knowledge appeared much earlier than Aristotle wrote his work People began creating maps before writing appeared In the Italian Camonica Valley, maps from the Bronze Age, presented in the form of cave paintings, have been preserved to this day Claudius Ptolemy, Greek astronomer, mathematician, cartographer in the 2nd century BC e formulated a definition of the concept of “cartography” His work “Guide to Geography” predetermined the development of cartographic science for 14 centuries to come The talent of surveyors and cartographers was in demand in the ancient world, and in ancient Greece it is also necessary for modern people Without specialists in this profession, it is impossible to design and build a building, register ownership of an apartment, land plot, private residential building, or go on a trip Modern geodesy deals with the study of the shapes, sizes of the Earth and methods of measurements on the earth's surface, in order to then display the obtained data on plans and maps Cartography studies how to create and use maps The month of March for Russian cartographers and surveyors is a month of formations and transformations March 14, 1720 - Peter I signed the Charter, which defined the purposes of mapping The cartographic survey of Russia began with this document In Rus', land records have been kept since the 9th century, but it was under Peter that they first began to use special instruments and tools, and to teach geodetic work Maintaining the land cadastre has become an important state matter The Petrine era gave impetus to the development of military topography and cartography On March 24, 1757, the Geographical Department was headed by Mikhail Vasilyevich Lomonosov On the initiative of an outstanding scientist, information about the economic geography and nature of Russian territories was collected in the provinces of Russia Lomonosov proposed sending expeditions to different regions to determine the exact coordinates of specific places On March 15, 1919, the Soviet era of geodesy and cartography began - the Higher Geodetic Administration (VGU) was established On March 1, 2009, after a series of transformations, the functions of the VSU were transferred to the Federal Service for State Registration, Cadastre and Cartography (Rosreestr) One of the oldest sciences remains quite in demand, necessary in the age of space technologies and transformations We have all been familiar with the results of the work of people involved in measuring territories, calculating coordinates, and creating maps since childhood and use these results throughout our lives We wish the representatives of this unusual, most interesting profession good weather and the latest instruments that will help them easily and accurately carry out geodetic surveys and draw up maps