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The term cosmography has two distinct meanings: traditionally it has been the protoscience of mapping the general features of the cosmos, heaven and Earth; more recently, it has been used to describe the ongoing effort to determine the large-scale features of the observable universe.
Premodern views of cosmography can be traditionally divided into those following the tradition of ancient near eastern cosmology, dominant in the Ancient Near East and in early Greece.
In 1551, Martín Cortés de Albacar, from Zaragoza, Spain, published Breve compendio de la esfera y del arte de navegar. Translated into English and reprinted several times, the work was of great influence in Britain for many years. He proposed spherical charts and mentioned magnetic deviation and the existence of magnetic poles.
Peter Heylin's 1652 book Cosmographie (enlarged from his Microcosmos of 1621) was one of the earliest attempts to describe the entire world in English, and is the first known description of Australia, and among the first of California. The book has four sections, examining the geography, politics, and cultures of Europe, Asia, Africa, and America, with an addendum on Terra incognita, including Australia, and extending to Utopia, Fairyland, and the "Land of Chivalry".
In 1659, Thomas Porter published a smaller, but extensive Compendious Description of the Whole World, which also included a chronology of world events from Creation forward. These were all part of a major trend in the European Renaissance to explore (and perhaps comprehend) the known world.
Using the Tully-Fisher relation on a catalog of 10000 galaxies has allowed the construction of 3D images of the local structure of the cosmos. This led to the identification of a local supercluster named the Laniakea Supercluster.
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