Still working on that pair (OTL & my TL) of maps: I'll post the latest versions soon, but want to make a few more changes first which will get them as far as I can manage without some serious research. Here is a list of the changes (excluding some that apply only to the my-TL version) that I've made since the last version posted:
North America _
1. The strip of land marked as 'terra nullius' between the Haudenosaunee (i.e. "Iroquois") and their southern neighbours has been extended slightly, because this seemed likely.
(I considered giving the Haudenosaunee back their TACOS colour -- as used on the original map from which I'm developing this one -- but decided finally against doing so, after all: This was partly due to my "NCS where possible" policy, and partly because then colouring the tribes to their south in NCS 'North America. Primary Natives' could have led to those being confused for some version of 'Spanish with more autonomy' whereas using NCS 'North America. Secondary Natives' instead might have been mistaken for some version of 'Haudenosaunee with more autonomy'...)
West Indies _
2. I've corrected the colours shown for ownership of certain islands, and added coloured squares to show ownership to [or next to] some that were previously shown just as black dots: All of those that have distinct political identities IOTL today should now be marked appropriately for that year: e.g. Dutch colour added for Aruba & Bonaire (Curacao already had this); French colour added to Tobago (which I'm fairly sure is right, although that island does hold the record for "Caribbean island that changed hands the most times during the Colonial Age"...); Grenada recoloured from Spanish to French; Montserrat recoloured from French to British; Dutch & French presences on various of the Leeward Islands shown correctly (including on St Maarten/St Martin, which was split between them); Danish presence in the Virgin Islands now shown.
South America _
3. The Mapuche have been shown as having a slight extension south-eastwards from the territory that I had already marked as theirs.
South Atlantic _
4. The Falkland Islands have been recoloured from 'Spain' to 'terra nullius', although now inside a 'Spain' box to show the Spanish claim to ownership, which I consider more accurately reflects the actual situation at that date.
5. South Georgia has been recoloured from [anachronistically] 'Britain' to 'terra nullius'.
Europe _
6. The Channel Islands (previously shown just as 2 black dots, for Jersey & Guernsey which are the largest members of that group) are now marked as British: The most north-easterly pixel of pink added, extending outwards from the markings around Jersey towards the coast of the Cotentin peninsula, covers Alderney which is the 3rd-largest of those islands.
(Next time that I work on this map, I'll probably modify those markings to 'British with more autonomy' because of the actual constitutional situation: Likewise, the colouring for the Isle of Man.)
7. The microstate of 'Couto Misto' has been added, as a single pixel in '[the Iberian] Galicia with more autonomy', between Spain and northern Portugal: Arguably it wasn't really large enough to be worth showing -- and I have omitted some microstates in Italy that were possibly larger -- but it was an interesting anomaly... and I saw somebody complaining, somewhere in this forum, about its omission from another map (which is how I learned about its existence in the first place).
8. Tuscany has been recoloured from 'Bohemia' (which I had used previously because its current Grand Duke was Francis of Lorraine, King of Bohemia and Emperor of the HRE) to 'Bohemia with more autonomy' (because it's run separately from the Kingdom... and mainly because that shade's easier to distinguish from the one for 'Austria', which was in use quite close nearby for the Hapsburgs' possessions around Milan).
9. Further south in Italy, I have added the Papal States' detached section at Benevento, which forms an enclave within Neapolitan territory. There wasn't room for their other one there [i.e. Pontecorvo] as well, but that's closer to their main block of territories anyway.
10. I have modified Switzerland's northern border slightly, reflecting the fact that at this date Austria's lands in south-western Germany still included a strip running for some distance along the Rhine's southern bank.
11. I have recoloured two separate pixels in south-western Germany in the 'Austria' colour, one just north of that salient into Switzerland and the other a little bit further east, to reflect the presence of scattered Austrian territories in that part of the country.
12. Oldenburg, which was in a personal union with Denmark at this date, was already marked in Denmark's colour: I have added that colour [as a single pixel in each case] to both mainland Holstein and its island of Heligoland, which were also held by the Danes although within the HRE.
13. Sweden's remaining territory inside the HRE, i.e. the western end of Pomerania, has also been marked with a single pixel in the appropriate colour.
14. I have recoloured the 'Church'-ruled states inside the HRE from 'Papal States' to 'Papal States with more autonomy', because the Pope doesn't have any actual say in their government.
15. I have made the colour-scheme used for the HRE's other members a bit simpler. The only ones of them not belonging to the Hapsburgs, to Electors, or to foreign monarchs that are still shown in distinct colours are_
Ansbach and Bayreuth (shown in 'Prussia with more autonomy', reflecting the fact that they are ruled by cadet branches of the Hohenzollerns: More properly they should have been shown in 'Brandenburg with more autonomy', because the family lines had split already before the Margaves of Brandenburg became Dukes of Prussia as well, but that doesn't show as clearly to my eyes);
Brunswick-Wolfenbuttl (shown in 'Hanover with more autonomy', reflecting the fact that its Duke heads a separate branch -- the senior one, actually -- of the family to which the Elector of Hanover also belongs);
and those belonging to the various non-Electoral branches of the 'Palatinate' Wittelsbach dynasty (shown, like the related Electorate iself, in 'Bavaria with more autonomy' because of course the Elector of Bavaria heads another branch of the Wittelsbachs).
(The region of Thuringia is such a tangle of small states -- & detached sections of other states, too -- that I haven't tried to separate out the 'Ernestine' branch of the Wettin family's various small duchies there by recolouring those correspondingly as 'Saxony with more autonomy'.) All of All of the other states involved are then shown just as 'HRE with more autonomy'.
This replaces the older system of colouring, in which (apart from the fact that Ansbach & Bayreuth were shown anachronistically, on the 1748 map, just as 'Prussia'...) gave individual colours to five of the six secular Electoral states (i.e. Brandenburg/Prussia, Saxony, Bavaria, Hanover, and Bohemia, although in fact the latter generally is given the 'Austria' colour instead when under Hapsburg control) plus two or three of the other "important" states, while all of the others -- including those shown out of the various areas held by any branch of the 'Palatinate' Wittelsbachs --were coloured according to which part of Germany they were in.
16. I have added, as a single pixel in that basic shade for small HRE members, the Principality of Liechtenstein.
17. I have re-drawn some of the borders shown between states in the HRE, to make identifying certain territories that I'd shown in "special" colours easier, and to fix some points on which I disagreed with the choices made for the older "1748" map. This includes adding some territories that were not visible (due to border-lines being placed over them, or just due to omission) in that older map, e.g. the Duchy of Berg (part of the Palatinate Wittelsbach's lands, but in the Ruhr area) and the Bishopric of Liege respectively. Also, as the scale meant that obviously many of the borders between small states had had to be omitted anyway I have removed any shown that separated only areas that -- after my recolouring -- were both shown/all shown just in the 'HRE with more autonomy' shade.
18. I have started to add the borders between different 'Crown Lands' within the Hapsburgs' territories, although this is still a work in progress. So far I have _
Added the boundaries between the various duchies & counties that the House's head held as nominally-separate members of the HRE, i.e. Austria proper [without the modern division into 'Upper" & "Lower" halves], Styria, Carinthia, Carniola, Tyrol, 'Further Austria [which included the modern Austrian province of Voralberg, as well as those scattered lands in S-Wn. Germany], and -- grouped as a single block, for now, because otherwise that area would have to be coloured as all-borders -- their Gorizia/Trieste/Istria lands. I've just realized that the map shows them as owning ALL of Istria, but in fact part of that peninsula actually belonged to Venice instead at that date... which is a detail that I'll have to fix next time;
Added the border between those "German" lands and the territories belonging to the Crown of Bohemia (i.e. Bohemia proper, Moravia, and Silesia), with the boundaries between those three divisions as well.
Added a border between all of those territories inside the HRE and Hungary, running along the eastern side of the line already showing the HRE's eastern limits, to indicate that it is run separately from any of those territories.
Added a border between Hungary proper and Transylvania, because they were counted & run as two separate Crown Lands during this period.
Added a one-pixel area just inside Hungary's border with Poland-Lithuania that is shown in the latter's colour: This represent the area identified on some historical maps as 'Zips' or 'Szipes', a small section of Hungary (mostly inhabited by Slovaks and Germans) where an earlier monarch had "pledged" various rights to Poland-Lithuania in exchange for a substantial loan and that none of his successors had managed to reclaim.
Still to do here: boundaries between Hungary and Croatia, and also between Hungary and the Banat of Temesvar; possibly also the 'Military Frontier', although I'm not sure about the precise boundaries for that at this time... and it might be accurate enough, working at this scale, to consider those districts as covered by some of the marked border-lines anyway...
So far I'm using the 'Feudal Entities' shade for the borders between the Hapsburgs' lands in "Germany", the lands of the 'Crown of Bohemia', Hungary, and Transylvania, with the 'Normal Administrative Divisions' shade for boundaries between the various Duchies & so on in the first of these or between the three basic sections of the second. Possibly I should make those actually 'National' & 'Feudal Entities' respectively, but the situation was complicated and didn't really meet those definitions either... For the boundary between Hungary and Croatia, which were considered lands under a shared "Crown" I'll use alternating pixels of the two levels; for the Banat's boundaries I'll use the 'Feudal Entities' shade, as that was yet another separate Crown Land rather than part of either Hungary or Transylvania.
19. For the Ukraine, I have used Library of Alexandria's 1750 patch, with NCS colouring swapped -- as I explained in my previous post would be the case -- for their chosen ones and with the boundaries for administrative divisions within each of the basic territories involved removed: The two small areas shown just as 'Russia with more autonomy' are the ones that LoA labelled as "Ethnic Palatinates", where special privileges were granted to encourage settlement by outsiders such as -- for a significant example -- Serbs.
20. The easternmost end of the Kalmyk territory, at their border with the Kazakhs on the 'Yaik' [nowadays called 'Ural'] River, has been shown with an higher level of Russian settlement, because I've found out that there was already a Cossack 'horde' also living there.
Siberia _
21. The Taimyr peninsula and some adjacent areas, although claimed by Russia (& shown as such), have been recoloured from 'Russia' to 'terra nullius' instead (reflecting both the low level of Russian involvement in that region and the hostility shown towards them by the local peoples): This is basically as on some of the other Worlda OTL maps, but I have extended the area involved from those by adding part of the next peninsula west which was also inhabited by a tribe from the same group.
Arabia _
22. I have swapped-over which part of Oman is shown in the basic shade of the colour for that country and which is shown in the 'with more autonomy' shade. There were actually two rival governments at this date, each fairly well established in it own area, and a good case could be made for either of the two possible colouring arrangements... but the "maritime" regime centred on Muscat is the one with which Europeans would be more likely to have contacts, and as the 'basic' shade is darker than the 'more autonomy' one assigning it to this side of the country make's the pixel in its colouring placed at its outpost of Zanzibar more visible against the blue of the sea. The strip of Africa's mainland coast across from Zanzibar did not yet recognize that regime and so, although it probably wasn't loyal to the "interior Oman" regime either, has been left in the 'more autonomy' shade. I'm not sure about the inclusion of the Comoros within that thalassocracy, as shown on the earlier map, but have left it shown in the 'more autonomy' shade as well for now.
23. I have removed the coastal patches of Omani control that I previously placed around Hormuz [in south-central Persia] and Gwadar [in the Baluchi Khanate of Khalat], because further research has indicated that the map from which I adapted them was anticipating the fact by a few decades in each case: In fact, the "maritime" Oman has recently had to defend its independence in Oman itself against Persia, and the "interior" Oman has actually sought Persian help against it...
24. I have shown Dhofar [along the coast south-west of Oman proper] as outside of Omani control altogether, which seems to be the correct situation for this date.
25. Also, the area around & including Qatar that the earlier map showed as belonging to Oman has been corrected as belonging to a state that the earlier map omitted altogether in favour of showing its coastal areas as either Omani or -- further north -- an Ottoman vassal: This is the 'Bani Khalid Emirate'. (Note: I need to change its inland boundaries to the same shade as is already used for those of its neighbours.)
26. The territories along the western coast of Arabia that were formerly shown in one of the 'Arabia'-designated colours have been recoloured as Ottoman vassals 'with more autonomy' instead, which I think is accurate for this period (although I still need to do more research about this).
India _
27. Surat (the second northern-most single-pixel area distinguished on the west coast, just north of the Portuguese outpost of 'Daman'), which houses both a British trading post and a Dutch one, recoloured in the "International" shade of light blue that Leonidas pointed out in the post before this.
Indian Ocean _
28. The islands of Mauritius, Reunion, and Rodriguez, have been correctly recoloured from 'terra nullius' to 'France'.
Africa _
29. Changes in the Omani sphere of influence, as mentioned above.
30. Egypt was effectively outside the Ottomans' direct authority at this date, due to assertive Mamelukes, so I have recoloured it as 'Ottoman with more autonomy', However as that situation was only de facto rather than de jure I have given it a border with the Ottomans' lands in Asia that is only shaded as 'Normal Administrative Division' rather than as 'Feudal Entity'.
Also, although I need to do more research on this point, I strongly suspect that the extension of Egyptian territory shown along the western shore of the Red Sea as far south as Eritrea is seriously anachronistic & should be removed.
