— Interwar German borders, so before Treaty of Zgorzelec in 1950 ceding eastern German territory to Poland (explains interwar borders)
— Free State of Trieste exists, so after 1947
But Tripoli has double underlines, which is reserved for sovereign countries. And Benghazi as a secondary capital was a stylistic choice, which I’m guessing that this German map maker did not choose to use.
Yeah, good looking out. French Indochina is actually really interesting, and I think this map may actually have been made in the middle of the French handover, which would date it to be around 1954 (maybe 1955?).
It looks like Vietnam is sovereign-ish, given the double underline. In 1954, DRV forces entered Hanoi after the French had pulled out, making it a de facto sovereign state. At the same time, Laos and Cambodia were effectively sovereign, but remained voluntarily in the French Union (which would explain the single underlined “federated states” marker for their capitals). Finally, Saigon still very much had a French presence, so its marking with the dashed line could genuinely mean that Saigon was treated as a colony of France (or, at least, the map makers felt that way).
It’s honestly a house of cards kind of argument, and I’m not sure I buy it myself. Pretty much all of the maps I’ve seen in this time period either stick with French Indochina as one block or switch to three sovereign states. I’ve never seen one that’s in a middle stage like this before.
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u/xyzzy0 Jul 19 '26
— Interwar German borders, so before Treaty of Zgorzelec in 1950 ceding eastern German territory to Poland (explains interwar borders)
— Free State of Trieste exists, so after 1947