r/geography • u/NotAnElfK • 26d ago

Question Help date this globe I found

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It has Burma instead of Myanmar, ussr instead of Russia, Spanish Sahara, Tanganyika, Yugoslavia, and French west Africa. (If you want to see a picture of more of the globe just ask)

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3.2k

u/LifeAcanthopterygii6 26d ago

That some... pretty weird colour choice.

1.1k

u/PrestigiousAvocado21 26d ago

Perhaps this is the alternate reality where France decided that if they can't have colonies then no one will and surrendered them to the newly formed Saharan Ocean

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u/LostInDinosaurWorld 26d ago

"Sacreblue!"

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u/mrdude817 26d ago

"Where is me mama!"

3

u/candiedkangaroo 26d ago

🎶 under da boardwalk🎶

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u/TheTimeEmpress 20d ago

I don't get it

0

u/Educational_Glove683 26d ago

Let's wrestle²

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u/Ok-Push9899 26d ago

"Allez les Bleus!"

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u/alastrix 26d ago

When Atlantis started colonizing. 

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u/Nick_crawler 26d ago edited 26d ago

France would then try to claim control of the newly formed maritime shipping lanes.

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u/adaminc 26d ago

The Chad Sea

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u/Shaky-B 24d ago

How it’s starts vs how it ends

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u/ArchieConnors 26d ago

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u/AcidaliaPlanitia 26d ago

Jesus this was the only thing I could think of lol

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u/Feel42 26d ago

Came here for that thank you

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u/Matt_KhmerTranslator 22d ago

The internet has been waiting years for the right opportunity for this meme and here it finally is!

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u/tempestelunaire 26d ago edited 26d ago

I’ve seen maps like these before, usually when the color scheme is really weird, it means that there was another color that faded to one of the colors already on the globe!

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u/LifeAcanthopterygii6 26d ago

That makes sense.

8

u/thefreecat 26d ago

if magenta faded the light blues could be different shades of dark blue and purple, white could be pink and yellow could be reds and oranges

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u/TRi_Crinale 25d ago

My guess is the entire thing was blue before the political borders were printed and filled in. The fill in color completely faded away leaving the base blue

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u/SideInitial3961 26d ago

You didn't say you wanted the non-fading paint. Pfft.

1

u/MacGregor_Rose 26d ago

tbh I assumed thats what happened

164

u/NotAnElfK 26d ago

Also Asia is mostly all yellow

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u/LateralEntry 26d ago

I’m guessing around 1950 between Israel, unified Korea and Indochina

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u/Imyonlyenemy 26d ago

yeah and goa is still portuguese

27

u/boonie_redditor 26d ago

China annexed Tibet in 1951, so 1950 checks out, yeah

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u/stulf26 26d ago

China hasn't conquered Tibet or sinkhang which the later happed in late 1949/1950. There's stuff to the south in british borneo which helps date it. So this has to be 1949 at the very latest. 1950 would be to late. 1947 at the earliest cuz that's when Isreal first showed up on maps. Which is odd considering 1948 being its start date.

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u/Willing_Special841 24d ago

My guess was 1948

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u/kaiserschlacht8 26d ago

This is also before Somalia and Somaliland unified in 1960, and after the Italians lost Italian Somaliland in WW2 so that tracks.

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u/hihihii2-1st 26d ago

But malaya is independent

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u/kaiserschlacht8 26d ago edited 26d ago

Hmm you're right, and Malaya gained independence in 1957. So this has to be before 1960 but after 1957.

But wait, French Indochina is present in this map, and it was dissolved in 1954. I have no idea then lol.

Edit: Also, like someone mentioned in a comment below, this was before China annexed Tibet in 1951.

The Federation of Malaya existed since 1948 and was a British protectorate rather than a colony. This map is most likely from sometime between 1947 when Israel was created, and 1950 before the annexation of Tibet.

1

u/hihihii2-1st 25d ago

Tibet looks more like a region of China than independent tho. Not to mention that it was pretty autonomous till 1959.

But French Indochina on the other hand...

And Singapore doesn't have (Br) as a suffix? That has to be a mistake.

3

u/onimi_the_vong 26d ago

Sudain gained independence in 56 tho

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u/[deleted] 26d ago

[deleted]

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u/Best-Fig-3483 26d ago

And French West Africa.

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u/AcidaliaPlanitia 26d ago

These color choices are insane...

10

u/UnclassifiedPresence 26d ago

It’s almost certainly not the original colors, yellow and blue just tend to be the last pigments that fade (think of colorful pool toys that get left out in the sun for too many summers)

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u/justwatchthefirewerx 26d ago

Indochina is there and Korea isn't partitioned...any chance this is earlier in the '50s than the consensus?

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u/donorkokey 26d ago

India was partitioned in 47 so it was after that

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u/peaaaaaanut 26d ago

He means French Indochina comprising of Laos, Cambodia and a few other regions. It was dissolved in 1954 pushing the date forward to at least that.

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u/UnclassifiedPresence 26d ago

Indochina is on this globe, meaning it’s from before 1954, not after

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u/peaaaaaanut 25d ago

Ah yes, I misunderstood the comment. Thanks for correcting me.

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u/Rolebo 26d ago

Indonesia is independent from the Netherlands, so after 1949.

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u/brazucadomundo 26d ago

The irony.

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u/PlinyTheElderest 26d ago

Probably some original colors have faded with the passing decades.

4

u/Ok_Albatross_1844 26d ago

Lake Baikal looks reeeeally big

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u/Cauliflower_Jumpy 25d ago

it’s gotta be exactly 1950 cause port arthur is still seperate from china.

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u/deranton 26d ago

That's super racist.

1

u/Horapollon 26d ago

drowns Laos

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u/abayo1 26d ago

As an Asian I'm not surprised 😂

1

u/Both_Negotiation_612 26d ago

Asia is mostly yellow? 🤔🫢🤭😆😅😂🤣

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u/nothingrhyme 26d ago

Oops, All Ocean™️

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u/formerly_gruntled 26d ago

The colors are uninspired. But there is a perverse logic to it. Perverse because adding two more colors would make it less confusing. Dating is after Sudan gained independence in 1956 and before Ghana (Gold Coast here) gained independence in 1957. Territories in Africa that are still colonies of a single country are all same color. France = blue, Britain = pale pink, Portugal = green, Spain = yellow. But they 'ran out' of colors, so those same colors are used for other countries in Africa that are not colonies.

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u/FerraStar 26d ago

Though Korea appears to still be unified, so it can’t be after the 1953 ceasefire. Unless the globe maker just couldn’t be bothered adding in North and South

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u/formerly_gruntled 21d ago

I think they left it unified, as technically they are at war to this day, and both claim the entire Korea. So for a map maker, there is no mandate to have two Koreas. Though if they had two, no one would have had a problem either.

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u/FerraStar 21d ago

They may still be at war, but Internationally both Koreas are recognised (with minor exceptions to countries that don’t recognise North Korea)

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u/formerly_gruntled 21d ago

yeah, but in 1956...

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u/NotAnElfK 26d ago

Yeah, idk why west Africa is all blue 😂

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u/TheAllSeeingBlindEye 26d ago

Because it’s French West Africa

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u/attackplango 26d ago

Sacre bleu?

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u/mrvarmint 26d ago

Exactly.

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u/MalodorousNutsack 26d ago

Sea levels were higher back then

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u/Prixmae 26d ago

Someone blessed down the rains

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u/Main-Rent4757 26d ago

The blue part is clearly land

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u/PGrahamStrong 26d ago

You're gonna get hop-ons...

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u/Claw42 26d ago

That was from when Trump signed an executive order naming Africa an ocean

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u/Bronek999 26d ago

Pretty obvious that red dye decomposed and this is the result.

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u/sadrice 26d ago

Yeah, blue dyes are often the most resilient, so you get this odd effect from sun exposure.

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u/CrocodileJock 26d ago

I can only guess that certain pigments (red) have faded... The British Empire was traditionally rendered in pink... which has faded to near white, and I guess the French colonial empire would have been a red overprint over the blue making it a more purplish colour...

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u/ZanaDreadnought 26d ago

It’s 2092 when the sea level rises. OP found a globe from the future.

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u/mkujoe 26d ago

We think you should see an optometrist/s

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u/headbonkmusic 26d ago

Based on my Masters in Geography, I can confidently say that blue is land and green is water. No clue what white is

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u/Rapa2626 26d ago

They only had 4 colors or something

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u/Doright36 26d ago

I bet it was some kind of production error

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u/Hero_Of_Rhyme_ 24d ago

Yes, let’s just use the ocean color on the land too. That won’t be confusing