Until the map's publication, the layout of the world had been based on the knowledge of the ancient Greeks.

①till 与 until 的意义和用法相同, 但句首一般不用 till 而用 until。②两者皆可用作介词和连词, 但两者都不能没有宾语, 因此都不是副词。③要注意在使用 until 或 till 表示汉语“直到...才”的时候, 常常要把汉语的肯定句改为否定句。
Till和 until普遍认为在口语和书面语中都可通用，而作为句子的第一个词时， until更为常用：
Until you get that paper written don't even think about going to the movies. · Till is actually the older word, with until having been formed by the addition to it of the prefix un-, meaning “up to.” In the 18th century the spelling 'till became fashionable, as if till were a shortened form of until. Although 'till is now nonstandard, 'til is sometimes used in this way and is considered acceptable, though it is etymologically incorrect.
除非你把那篇文章写完了，否则别想去看电影。 Till实际上是这两个词中较早使用的一个，在它前面加一个表示“直到”的前缀 un-构成了 until。在18世纪， 'till这种拼写方式很时髦，似乎 till成了 until的缩写形式。尽管 'till现在不是标准的用法，即使从词源学角度讲它是不正确的， 'til有时还这样使用，而且被认为是可以接受的