Butterfly World Map

The Octahedral Butterfly Map of the World was created by Bernard J.S. Cahill (1866-1944) and first published in 1909. Much like the Dymaxion map of the Earth created by Buckminster Fuller, the Butterfly Map of the World does a good job of minimizing areal distortion and displaying continents equally.

The Butterfly Map of the World concept has been revived and expanded on by Steve Waterman who is currently developing Waterman's Polyhedron, a map similar to the Butterfly Map of the World.

B.J.S. Cahill's original Butterfly Map, 1909

More Information

• The Butterfly World Map (Image)
• Waterman's Polyhedron,
• B.J.S. Cahill Butterfly Map Resource Page
• The Nomenclature and Classification of Map Projections Empire Survey Review No. 51, Vol VII January 1944 Pages 190-200 ; L.P. Lee, Lands Survey Department, Wellington, N.Z.
• Matching the Map Projection to the Need
• List of ESRI-supported map projections
• Weisstein, Eric W. Map Projections. From MathWorld--A Wolfram Web Resource.
• Map Projections. Atlas of Canada.
• Cartographical Map Projections, Carlos A. Furuti website, www.progonos.com.
• Elements of Map Projection. (26 MB download) U.S. Coast and Geodetic Survey, Special Publication 68 (1938).
• Map Projections. USGS Publications. December 2000.
• What are map projections? ArcGIS 10 Online Help
• University of Colorado at Boulder - Map Projection Overview with Illustrations
• Data Projections. GeoCommunity Web site.
• Wiki.GIS.com - Types of Projections