I just stumbled on this thread for the first time and this is what I thought before I read it all:
-imagine standing with a compass in front of you, with an arrow on one end. If you rotate yourself around, at some point the compass will face straight to you / away from you. You are now facing either north or south - for simplicity's sake let's say north. (Sorry Max!!!)
-if you now map what's in front of you, stuff in the far north ends up at the top of the page. By extension, stuff behind you must belong at the bottom of the page.
This makes visual sense to me. It also suggests that maps might have started off with either north or south at the top of the page, then inevitably one had to win out as the standard. (Dangerous aside in a forum like this one, but it's a bit like which side of the road to drive - the only places I know of where you drive on the left are islands...)
I find myself much more flummoxed by the idea of a map with east at the top than that of a map with south at the top. Now, has anyone come across maps with west at the top? We need to be sure no-one is disavantaged!!!
