[hencq]

An absolutely terrific book about (among other things) this is The Discoverers by Daniel J. Boorstin. He goes into a lot of detail on how map making in Europe for the longest time was driven, as you say, more by religious importance than anything else. Interestingly when Europeans did get more serious about accurate maps this was for a large part driven by the search for the fabled Prester John, a Christian king thought to be ruling in India or Africa.