Can you rotate minecraft maps in your hand?

I know you can rotate them on the item frames, but can you rotate them in your hand somehow?

Im having a hard time trying to put together maps zoomed out 2 times in a wall, I always loose track of which region should I use the map to take the adjacent region. It would be great if I could rotate them to match the orientation im using on the wall.

Solution 1:

Unfortunately there is no way to rotate a map in your hand. You can only rotate maps in an itemframe.

I can give you one tip to make things easier though: first create a temporary map wall with all your maps unrotated. Now it's much easier to do all your mapping. Once you are done mapping and your temporary map wall is filled, you can take out the maps one by one from your temporary map wall and place them in the correct position on your final map wall.

You could also make a big arrow in your world somewhere pointing to the north. Now you can see on your mapwall which way is north and you can then also see in which direction you have to go. You can find the direction you are facing in the f3 screen.

Solution 2:

Unfortunately you can't do that.
The rotation is a property of the item frame (of which the map is an exception, because it only has 4 rotations, not 8), not of the map. North on a map is always up. Maybe it helps a bit to hold the map while facing away from your map wall, press F5 (or whatever your third person view button is) and then look down. That way you can see the map in your hands and the one on your wall in the same rotation, but distorted/small.
If that's not good enough, you have to go the tedious way: Create it north-up in a different place first, then move it to the destination one by one.

Rotating maps in your hand would be a good feature. You can suggest it in the Minecraft forum, on Reddit or on Twitter.