--- title: Explorers and how the world was mapped — a lesson of Mova's school · trees and pragmatics description: «Explorers and how the world was mapped», a lesson of the world course of Mova's primary school, sentence by sentence with dependency trees and pragmatics. It begins: Long ago nobody had a map of the whole world. --- [Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/world/98-explorers-mapping-the-world/) [home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [school](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/) / [World](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/world/) / Explorers and how the world was mapped # Explorers and how the world was mapped Lesson 98 of the world course of Mova's primary school: 24 sentences, each with its syntax tree and pragmatics. The lessons are written for Mova, and their agreed trees are part of Mova corpus 0.4 (CC BY-SA 4.0). How Mova does on its tests: [the lesson at school](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/school-run/world/98-explorers-mapping-the-world/). - [0](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/world/98-explorers-mapping-the-world/0/) — Long ago nobody had a map of the whole world. - [1](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/world/98-explorers-mapping-the-world/1/) — Each people knew its own lands well, but far-off places were blank or filled with guesses. - [2](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/world/98-explorers-mapping-the-world/2/) — Explorers travelled into the unknown and brought back descriptions, so mapmakers could fill in the gaps bit by bit. - [3](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/world/98-explorers-mapping-the-world/3/) — Polynesian sailors crossed thousands of kilometres of the Pacific Ocean in canoes, finding islands by reading the stars, the waves and the flight of birds. - [4](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/world/98-explorers-mapping-the-world/4/) — Vikings reached North America about a thousand years ago, and Chinese fleets under Zheng He sailed to Africa in the early 1400s. - [5](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/world/98-explorers-mapping-the-world/5/) — In 1492 Christopher Columbus sailed west from Spain hoping to reach Asia, but he landed in the Caribbean, in lands Europeans did not know. - [6](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/world/98-explorers-mapping-the-world/6/) — Ferdinand Magellan's expedition set off in 1519, and in 1522 one of its ships came home — the first voyage all the way around the world. - [7](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/world/98-explorers-mapping-the-world/7/) — Magellan himself was killed on the way. - [9](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/world/98-explorers-mapping-the-world/9/) — Latitude was found from the height of the Sun or the Pole Star in the sky. - [10](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/world/98-explorers-mapping-the-world/10/) — Longitude was much harder: the Earth turns a quarter-circle every six hours, so comparing local noon with a clock still set to home time shows how far east or west you are. - [11](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/world/98-explorers-mapping-the-world/11/) — Only in the 1700s did John Harrison build clocks good enough to keep time on a rocking ship. - [12](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/world/98-explorers-mapping-the-world/12/) — Today satellites photograph every part of the Earth, and GPS can tell your position to within a few metres — but the last great blank spaces, like the poles, were reached only about a hundred years ago. - [13](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/world/98-explorers-mapping-the-world/13/) — Polynesian navigators crossed the Pacific by reading the stars, the waves and the flight of birds. - [14](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/world/98-explorers-mapping-the-world/14/) — Vikings led by Leif Erikson reached North America about a thousand years ago. - [15](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/world/98-explorers-mapping-the-world/15/) — In the early 1400s Chinese fleets led by Zheng He sailed as far as East Africa. - [16](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/world/98-explorers-mapping-the-world/16/) — In 1492 Columbus sailed west hoping to reach Asia but reached islands in the Caribbean. - [18](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/world/98-explorers-mapping-the-world/18/) — Magellan's expedition made the first voyage around the world, from 1519 to 1522; Magellan died on the way. - [19](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/world/98-explorers-mapping-the-world/19/) — Captain James Cook mapped the coasts of New Zealand and eastern Australia around 1770. - [21](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/world/98-explorers-mapping-the-world/21/) — Roald Amundsen's team was the first to reach the South Pole, in 1911. - [22](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/world/98-explorers-mapping-the-world/22/) — Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay were the first to stand on top of Mount Everest, in 1953. - [23](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/world/98-explorers-mapping-the-world/23/) — Latitude tells how far north or south a place is; longitude tells how far east or west. - [24](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/world/98-explorers-mapping-the-world/24/) — The farther north a ship sails, the higher the Pole Star stands in the sky. - [25](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/world/98-explorers-mapping-the-world/25/) — The Earth turns 15 degrees of longitude every hour, so a difference in time shows a difference in longitude; if the home clock is later than your local noon, you are west of home. - [26](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/world/98-explorers-mapping-the-world/26/) — John Harrison built clocks in the 1700s accurate enough to find longitude at sea. - ← previous: [Festivals, holidays and traditions in the English-speaking world](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/world/97-festivals-holidays-traditions/) - next →: [Transport: from horses to planes](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/world/99-transport-horses-to-planes/) - ↑ back to [World](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/world/)