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Hilariously Bad Attempts By Americans to Draw Europe From Memory, With an Unexpected Twist

December 20, 2015 4 Comments

Europe-from-memory-Kappose-USA

European Map created by American reddit user Kappose

Earlier this week reddit user nerkuras challenged r/Europe to Draw a map of Europe from memory only.

Several American users took on the challenge and created the hilariously bad maps you can see here. However, there’s not one but two unexpected twists to the story, revealed in the maps below:

Europe-from-memory-LoLredditaccount-USA

Map created by American user LoLredditaccount. I think a few countries might be missing…

Europe-from-memory-Raven0520-USA

Map created by American user Raven0520. The Czech Republic is where now?

Europe-from-memory-SwamanII-USA

Map created by American user SwamanII. Probably the best American attempt.

As you can see not all the American attempts are really that bad. The last map above by SwamanII not only gets many of the major features right, they’ve also managed to include many major cities on the map (although south-eastern Europe is looking pretty empty).

In all fairness, Europe is really tough to draw and is not something American’s probably spend a lot of time looking at. However, Europeans should be able to do a lot better right?

I’ll let you be the judge:

Europe-from-memory-Gerrit-Jan-Netherlands

Map created by Dutch user Gerrit-Jan. The blue is water.

Europe-from-memory-Butt_Billionaire-Nor

Map created by Norwegian user Butt_Billionaire. At least most of the countries are there.

Europe-from-memory-7077x-Romania

Map created by Romanian user 7077x. Missing a few country names.

Europe-from-memory-sexually__oblivious-Norway

Map created by Norwegian user sexually__oblivious. Well at least some countries have names.

Europe-from-memory-DerpGamerFTW-Austria

Map created by Austrian user DerpGamerFTW. A solid attempt that’s just missing country names.

So based on the maps above European redditors, don’t appear to be a whole lot better than Americans at drawing their own continent.

In a final twist of irony the best map from the thread was drawn by Turkish user Yetkinler:

Europe-from-memory-Yetkinler-Turkey

Map created by Turkish user Yetkinler

And if you don’t understand why that’s ironic, maybe this satirical map will help:

Europe-from-memory-VujkePG-Mac

Map created by Macedonian user VujkePG

Want to learn to draw better? The following books may help:

  • How to Draw Fantasy Art and RPG Maps: Step by Step Cartography for Gamers and Fans
  • Drawing for the Absolute Beginner: A Clear & Easy Guide to Successful Drawing (Art for the Absolute Beginner)
  • How to Draw Cool Stuff: A Drawing Guide for Teachers and Students
  • Strathmore Series 400 Sketch Pads 9 in. x 12 in. – pad of 100

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Filed Under: Europe Tagged With: hand-drawn

Comments

  1. silvia says

    June 13, 2016 at 6:53 pm

    The most remarkable thing in the 4th map is that it includes Galicia, the Basque Country and Catalonia!! (Although it doesn’t label Catalonia and calls the Basque Country Basques)
    How many Europeans know where those stateless nations are? How many Europeans know they exist at all?

    Reply
    • Tamás Molnár says

      September 19, 2016 at 12:18 pm

      All of them.

      Reply
  2. leBRON James says

    February 21, 2017 at 3:45 pm

    hello this is a remarkable site

    Reply
  3. noyb says

    August 16, 2019 at 4:03 pm

    Eh, all of those are way better than I’d do with “draw the US states into this outline of North America”, or “draw Africa from memory”, but yeah, let’s just pick on the US education system.

    Reply

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