This is a large-scale map to be found on p. 275 in En Asie Centrale à la Vapeur (1888) written by Napoléon Ney. It gives us an illustration to Ney’s account of his journey from Paris to Russian Turkestan, to attend the inauguration of the Transcaspian railway to Samarkand on the 27th of May in 1888. Ney travels for 17 days by train through Europe, the Caucasus and Siberia, and crosses the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea by steamboat on his way to Samarkand. He offers a detailed description of the construction of the Transcaspian railway together with comments on the opportunities that this communication system means for Russian economic power in Central Asia.

The present map shows existing railways from Europe to Asia as well as planned railways. Another map is to be found on p. 285 in the same book depicting the Transcaspian railway.