Telegraph – International Traffic
This series of maps gives a visual impression of the development of international communications by telegraphy from 1860 to 1930. Fortunately, the communications sector has provided us with very good statistics, not only on the infrastructure, but also on its use. Of all the European telecommunication systems, telegraphy is the one best documented. The data presented in these maps has been taken from a variety of transnational sources now contained in the TIE-Database maintained at Eindhoven University of Technology. The maps show the international traffic by telegraph, using the number of telegrams sent across international boundaries. As the key indicator for the performance of this infrastructure the number of telegrams sent across Europe (and the world) by cable across international boundaries has been chosen. It is shown on the maps in form of a pie-chart diagram. In these diagrams a subdivision is made according to the direction of traffic, i.e. between incoming, outgoing and transitory traffic. The latter implies that a telegram is routed through one (or more) countries to its final destination and has been counted as “transit” in countries where it passed through. The maps present the development of the traffic in ten-year intervals. In terms of scaling, the series has been broken into two sub-series, one from 1860-1890, the other from 1890-1930. There are two maps for 1890, each having a different scale. Within these to sub-series, the viewer can compare the growth of traffic by size of the digrams.
