Prohibitions and permissions to movement are the primary drivers to the composition of knowledge about terrestrial space. This is demonstrated in emphasized landscape features, whether in the rare essay on maps or in remarks by advisers to the throne. The seminal function of prohibitions and permissions to movement is further demonstrated in remarks located in other early Chinese texts with distinctly military or administrative valences. Given that the composition of early maps is largely dependent on movement, and thus on travel reports, they are very open to distortion and misappropriation. These compositional operations have epistemic consequences, not simply for how the knowledge produced is used by officials, but why officials need to keep such valuably abstracted knowledge hidden; indeed, how they need to keep all measurable knowledge hidden until it is necessary to disclose. The core of early Chinese sovereignty is vulnerable to the depredations of those who abuse measurement, especially when measurement is governed by the personal travel of those whose reports may be governed by ulterior motives.