Tony Buzan is considered the author of modern mind maps. Yet it must be said that the idea of structured thinking is much older and dates back to the Middle Ages. In this part of the module, we will briefly outline the history of mind maps.

The first to use mind maps was Porphyrios of Tyre (232-304), a Neo-Platonic philosopher, passionate opponent of Christianity and advocate of vegetarianism, who wondered how to make the works of Aristotle more apparent to his audience. He was primarily concerned with his system of categories. According to this philosopher, everything has a substance and accidents (cases), i.e., properties that can be said about a body (quality, quantity, time, place, relation). It was to represent these schemata for different objects. Porphyrios used graphical diagrams that resembled mind maps.

The Spanish philosopher Ramon Llull (1232-1315) built on it in the Middle Ages. He saw diagrams like this as a source of knowledge. Indeed, his most famous charts are called the Tree of Knowledge and the Tree of the Philosophy of Love. These were artistically quite successful objects intended to outline complex ideas to the reader that would be difficult to read from texts.

Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519), one of the most influential scientists of his time, is considered to be the founder of mind maps in the true sense of the word. His notes, in whatever form, bear the marks of creativity, ideas and an attempt to make them as difficult to read as possible for other people. He created these notes by combining images, words, texts and formulas into a single work that captured his entire view of a problem.

The concept of graphic representation of some information appears quite often in historical materials. Still, for quite a long time, it lacked clear rules and more often, the precursors of mind maps were more like charts or trees.

The change came in the 1950s when Alan Collins and, in 1960, Ross Quillian developed the concept of semantic networks to understand and describe human learning and creativity. They hypothesized that it was also a way that could help us better understand how the brain works. The modern history of mind mapping had begun!

A decade later, took the ideas of his predecessors and lay down the ground rules for how these networks should be formed, calling this method Minds Maps. At the same time, offers a model of Conceptual (or Terms) Maps .

From the point of view of history, it is interesting that all authors (except da Vinci) were interested in the use of mind maps in education and training. The graphic representation of ideas was intended to lead to a better understanding of them by the audience, stimulate discussion, and develop the ability to learn. And it is this legacy that the mind maps in various variations to this day.