Historically, Western cartography often featured distortions (proportionate, proximate, and commercial) of places and true distances by placing the cartographer's homeland in the centre of the "mapamundi"; these ideas were often utilized to support imperialistic expansion. In contemporary cartography, the polar-perspective maps of the northern hemisphere, drawn by U.S. cartographers, also frequentlly feature distorted spatial relations (distance, size, mass) of and between the U.S. and Russia which according to historian Jerome D. Fellman emphasise the perceived inferiority (military, cultural, geopolitical) of the Russian Other.