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features | introduction

Features Overview:

Geography (from Greek: γεωγραφία, geographia, literally "earth description") is a field of science devoted to the study of the lands, features, inhabitants, and phenomena of the Earth and planets. The first person to use the word γεωγραφία was Eratosthenes (276-194 BC).

From : Wikipedia: Geography

There are millions of different types of "feature" that we can identify in the world around us. How we interpret the landscape depends on a) our perspective and b) how we classify things. When it comes to maps we have to be very clear about what and how we record these objects.

A simple approach has been adopted here in breaking the scope of features into four main groups - as outlined below:

Types of feature & links to examples:

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Natural Environment

Features that have developed naturally (and continue to do so) as part of the evolution of our planet such as mountains and rivers. In many developed countries many of these features have been modified by humans eg rivers.

Explore natural features here....

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Built Environment

Physical structures to support habitation, travel and operations [such as fields for harvesting crops or factories to create goods]. These features are most likely to be of human origin - but not always.

Explore the built environment here....

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Associated Geographies

This may not be a familiar term but associated geographies are common to us all. However they are largely invisible in the landscape, they include things like boundaries [national, local authority, property extents etc] and many more examples.

Explore associated geographies here....

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