The vaccinia virus HindIII D fragment is 16,060 bp in length and encodes 13 complete genes [E.G. Niles et al. (1986). Virology 153, 96-112; S. L. Weinrich and D. E. Hruby (1986). Nucleic Acids Res. 14, 3003-3016]. Six of these genes are expressed only at early times after infection and one gene is expressed at both early and late times [G. -J. Lee-Chen and E. G. Niles (1988). Virology 163, 52-63]. Transcript mapping by S1 nuclease protection studies was carried out and compared to the results of primer extension analyses, in order to locate map positions of the 5' termini of each early mRNA. The lengths of the products of in vitro transcription, from DNA templates which possess the transcription start regions of each of the early genes, were determined and compared to the lengths of DNA products generated by S1 nuclease protection and primer extension, in order to demonstrate that the 5' termini identified by S1 mapping and primer extension are due to transcription initiation and not to mRNA processing. For each of the early genes in the HindIII D fragment, transcription starts within 25 nucleotides of the translation initiation codon. The precise location of the 3' termini of each early transcript was identified by S1 nuclease mapping. In all but one case, the 3' ends map within 75 nucleotides of the putative transcription termination signal TTTTTNT [G. Rohrmann, L. Yuen, and B. Moss (1986).