Historical maps, like this world map from the Portolan Atlas by Battista Agnese, included wind heads—illustrations of human faces with puffed cheeks to indicate wind directions.
Initially developed in the 13th century as practical tools for mariners, Portolan charts later became fashionable art.
Photograph Courtesy The Sunderland Collection
Initially developed in the 13th century as practical tools for mariners, Portolan charts later became fashionable art.
Photograph Courtesy The Sunderland Collection
From National Geographic by Lucy Handley
Humans have been captivated by the mysteries of the Earth and stars for centuries, documenting their explorations in stunning and varied ways.
Egyptian scholar Claudius Ptolemy—known as the “inventor of geography”—revolutionized the field by recording latitude and longitude in the second century A.D., while Gerardus Mercator’s 16th-century world projection remains influential today.
Maps during the Middle Ages (around 500 to 1500 A.D.) served less as navigational aids and more as “a visual summary of all human knowledge,” says cartographer Peter Barber.
While modern viewers might chuckle at historical inaccuracies—such as California depicted as an island until the late 18th century—many of these antique maps were filled with remarkably accurate details.
Thanks to the newly launched online platform Oculi Mundi (the eyes of the world), the public can now see these rare maps and atlases.
This treasure trove, known as the Sunderland Collection, showcases how European scholars meticulously represented their world from the 13th century to the early 1800s.
This collection highlights cartography’s evolution and offers a window into past civilizations’ historical perspectives and artistic achievements.
Early challenges in mapping
For a long time, people believed that the Earth was the fixed center of the universe, with the sun and planets revolving around it—a theory proposed by Ptolemy.
However, a 1532 map created by the German scholar Sebastian Munster depicted a different idea: it showed angels using levers to move the Earth.
Helen Sunderland-Cohen, who manages the Oculi Mundi collection, notes that this map’s unique depiction was both subtle and groundbreaking.
“[It] would have been radical—perhaps heretical—when it was produced,” she says.
Representing the Earth’s round shape on flat paper was challenging for mapmakers.
To address this challenge, Italian engraver Giovanni Cimerlino designed a heart-shaped map in 1566 that displayed both the eastern and western halves of the world, including the Americas.
Humans have been captivated by the mysteries of the Earth and stars for centuries, documenting their explorations in stunning and varied ways.
Egyptian scholar Claudius Ptolemy—known as the “inventor of geography”—revolutionized the field by recording latitude and longitude in the second century A.D., while Gerardus Mercator’s 16th-century world projection remains influential today.
Maps during the Middle Ages (around 500 to 1500 A.D.) served less as navigational aids and more as “a visual summary of all human knowledge,” says cartographer Peter Barber.
While modern viewers might chuckle at historical inaccuracies—such as California depicted as an island until the late 18th century—many of these antique maps were filled with remarkably accurate details.
Thanks to the newly launched online platform Oculi Mundi (the eyes of the world), the public can now see these rare maps and atlases.
This treasure trove, known as the Sunderland Collection, showcases how European scholars meticulously represented their world from the 13th century to the early 1800s.
This collection highlights cartography’s evolution and offers a window into past civilizations’ historical perspectives and artistic achievements.
Early challenges in mapping
For a long time, people believed that the Earth was the fixed center of the universe, with the sun and planets revolving around it—a theory proposed by Ptolemy.
However, a 1532 map created by the German scholar Sebastian Munster depicted a different idea: it showed angels using levers to move the Earth.
Helen Sunderland-Cohen, who manages the Oculi Mundi collection, notes that this map’s unique depiction was both subtle and groundbreaking.
“[It] would have been radical—perhaps heretical—when it was produced,” she says.
Representing the Earth’s round shape on flat paper was challenging for mapmakers.
To address this challenge, Italian engraver Giovanni Cimerlino designed a heart-shaped map in 1566 that displayed both the eastern and western halves of the world, including the Americas.
Giovanni Cimerlino’s 1566 heart-shaped (or cordiform) map is notable for its accurate illustrations of North and South America.
Photograph Courtesy The Sunderland Collection
Photograph Courtesy The Sunderland Collection
By 1660, the idea that the planets orbit the sun—known as the heliocentric model—was still debated, even though we now understand it to be correct.
Andreas Cellarius’ celestial atlas is considered one of the finest ever created, showcasing early mapmakers’ intricate and bold efforts to represent the cosmos.
The revolutionary contributions of early geographers
Maps of the past often reflected the cultural and political biases of their creators.
They were not merely navigational tools but also instruments of power, propaganda, and education.
For example, maps sometimes exaggerated the extent of a ruler’s domain or emphasized specific trade routes to assert dominance and influence.
One of the most significant explorations during the era covered by Oculi Mundi is Christopher Columbus’s 1492 voyage to the Americas.
One map, part of cartographer Johannes Ruysch’s Ptolemaic Atlas, calls South America “Terra Sancta Crucis sive Mundus Novus” (the Land of the Holy Cross or New World).
It is one of the earliest printed maps to depict the American continent.
Although this map is not entirely accurate by modern standards, Barber says it captures “the excitement of discovery and the bafflement of people in trying to assess what things are.”
Another notable map is a 1603 hand-colored world map by Flemish cartographer Abraham Ortelius.
“This was the first atlas in the modern sense of the word, and hence a pretty major step in getting things ‘right’ geographically: it pulls together all the world and sets it out methodically, just as we are used to atlases doing now,” says Sunderland-Cohen.
This atlas is significant as it represents the first modern atlas, methodically organizing and presenting the world as we are familiar with today.
Ortelius’s map is also important for including “Terra Australis nondum cognita” (Unknown Southern Land), a hypothetical continent believed to exist in the southern hemisphere.
Abraham Ortelius’s s 16th-century “Theatrum Orbis Terrarum” was the first modern atlas to provide the most comprehensive representation of the known world at the time.
Photograph Courtesy The Sunderland Collection
Photograph Courtesy The Sunderland Collection
Matthew Edney, a professor in the history of cartography at the University of Southern Maine, says that Ortelius’s map reflects the belief in this southern continent based on existing ideas of the time.
While Europeans began exploring Australia in the early 17th century, it was in the 19th century that ships were strong enough to approach Antarctica.
Edney says this depiction of a vast southern land mass “is not an error; it’s a history of trying to make sense of the world.”
The evolution of geography
Sunderland-Cohen says understanding the accuracy of historical maps requires considering their context.
“In some cases, it’s not that they’re wrong, per se; it’s just that they’re presenting this huge geographical area or idea, and they’re trying to express it.”
Scholars and mapmakers often highlighted certain features based on the information they had.
For example, if a scholar had extensive knowledge about a particular trade route, that route would be prominently featured on their map.
Katherine Parker, cartographic collections manager at the Royal Geographical Society, says that “most new geographic features would debut on one mapmaker’s map.
Others would then see it and decide if they trusted the sources and depiction enough to include it on their maps.”
Historical maps often included distinctive features, such as wind heads—illustrations of human faces with puffed cheeks representing wind directions.
These were both functional for maritime navigation and decorative.
Over time, maps also began incorporating allegorical scenes, such as illustrations representing the seasons.
In a way, map representations will never be entirely accurate due to the inherent challenge of depicting a spherical world on a flat surface, says Barber.
“Whatever you produce on a flat piece of paper is not in itself going to tell the whole truth, so you have to make compromises,” he says, “The compromises that you make depend very much on what you consider to be important.”
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