Why do world maps always show the Americas on the west and Asia on the east?

Question

If the world is round can we make any point of the world the center in maps? Or is there a specific reason all the world maps show the continents in the same orientation?

In: 6

Answer 1

Two main reasons are:-

1) The Prime Meridian runs through the United Kingdom. This divides the planet into Eastern and Western Hemispheres. By convention, west is on the left, east on the right.

2) Most exploration of the world was done setting out from Europe and many modern maps are based on Mercator’s projection. These maps tended to be Eurocentric as they were drawn by Europeans.