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Up until the 18th century, maps were often decorated with fanciful beasts and monsters, at the expense of accurate details about places. French mapmakers of the 1700s and 1800s encouraged the use of more scientific methods in the art they called cartographie. The French word cartographie (the science of making maps), from which we get our English word cartography, was created from carte, meaning "map," and -graphie, meaning "representation by." Around the same time we adopted cartography in the mid-19th century, we also created our word for a mapmaker, cartographer.
Examples of cartographer in a Sentence
Joseph Howlett, Scientific American, 25 Jan. 2026
The three-judge panel held a hearing last month and heard testimony from some of the plaintiffs, political scientists and a cartographer.
—Caroline Vakil, The Hill, 14 Jan. 2026
One map at the Osher Library — titled Uprooted People of the USA — was produced in 1945 by Louise Jefferson, a black graphic designer and cartographer.
—Jackie Northam, NPR, 7 Dec. 2025
One last thing the dorm-room cartographer taught us this week: citizens armed with open tools can now beat the pros.
—Newsweek Editors, MSNBC Newsweek, 26 Nov. 2025
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Cite this Entry
“Cartographer.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/cartographer. Accessed 3 Feb. 2026.
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cartographer
noun
