John Kirtland Wright

“ At a very early period the Greeks developed the idea (borrowed, perhaps, from the Babylonians [16] ) that the earth is a flat disk surrounded by the Ocean Stream. This conception seems to have given rise to a cartographic tradition followed by certain ancient and medieval map-makers who had long outgrown the belief that the earth is actually flat. Thus Leardo draws a circular land mass, or oikoumene, surrounded by a narrow hem of water. ”

“ East of the lower Volga is a “desert of thirty days” (10) , Polo’s mysterious demon-haunted desert of Lop, where the traveler hears ringing bells and other uncanny sounds (possibly “singing sands”) . Like the Grand Khan’s tomb, this desert is also wofully misplaced, since the actual desert of Lop lies in eastern Chinese Turkestan. The responsibility is not Leardo’s, however, for the Lop desert is in the same place on the Catalan Atlas of 1375 and on the Este map. ”

“ The calendars encircling Leardo’s three maps constitute exceptional additions. Of these calendars, the one on the Society’s map is the most interesting. The inscription in the panel below the circles, in part an explanation of the calendar, is somewhat awkwardly phrased in the Venetian dialect of the fifteenth century, but, although it lacks the beginning of each line, the meaning is fairly clear, especially when certain of the missing lines are reconstructed from the corresponding inscription on the map in Vicenza. ”

“ A strict interpretation of Ptolemy’s data would have necessitated a complete redrafting of the outlines of the continents, as was done on the Ptolemaic atlases of the mid- and late fifteenth century. Leardo made no such attempt. The extent of his concession to the 10 Ptolemaic geography was to sprinkle a few of Ptolemy’s names over a medieval base and to add the Rivers Indus and Oechardes in eastern Asia. ”

“ Leardo’s place names along the Mediterranean and Black Sea coasts are all derived from the portolan charts, although Leardo wrote names only where it was easy to do so without crowding. The least successful portion of Leardo’s Mediterranean coast is that of Spain: the shore is here unduly elongated as compared with that of the Este Catalan map, Barcelona (475) and Ampurias (476) being placed too far northeast on what ought to be the French shore line. ”

“ The Society’s map is of primary interest as revealing a conception of the earth’s surface typical of the century preceding the discovery of America. In its blending of colors and pleasing general composition it forms a work of art of no slight decorative value. Furthermore, the encircling calendar and many details on the map proper are distinctly unusual. [5] The Society has therefore undertaken the publication of a full-sized colored facsimile, in explanation of which the present book was prepared. Drawn on a piece of parchment measuring 281⁄2 by 233⁄8 inches (72.4 × 59.4 cm.) ”

“ The coloring of the map was done by overprinting, in lithography, as many colors as were deemed necessary to convey a fair idea of the original. Lithographic plates were made from the color separation negatives mentioned above. The principles underlying the lithographic process are, broadly, similar to those described for gelatin printing, the essential elements in the process being a water-absorbing ground mass (limestone) in place of the gelatin and a water-repelling and ink-attracting surface affection similar to that created by the action of light on the chromated gelatin film. ”

“ The gulf (11) , which 12 contains three islands, appears in almost the same position and form on the Este map, where there is a legend explaining that on the islands griffons and falcons are found and that the natives are not allowed to kill them without the permission of the Grand Khan of the Tatars. This is also from Marco Polo, who writes that the islands where the gerfalcons are bred lie so far north that the North Star is left behind you in the south! The mountains southeast of the gulf make an enclosure shaped something like a θ (42-47) . ”

“ Lithographic stone is an amorphous carbonate of lime of fine, close texture. It has an affinity for water—that is, it is easily kept damp. This affinity may be destroyed by changing the carbonate of lime to some water-resisting salt, such as the oleate, or by adding to the surface of the stone a film having the same power. Both of these methods were utilized in making the color plates of the Leardo Map. ”

“ Leardo preserves the faulty orientation of the Mediterranean characteristic of the latter. If we assume that the perpendicular 17 line extending from the wind-blower off the west coast of Spain through Jerusalem to the wind-blower east of the Terrestrial Paradise is intended to run due east and west, we see that the axis of the Mediterranean with the adjoining shores has been turned counter-clockwise some twelve degrees. This is probably because of failure on the part of the makers of the original portolan charts to take into consideration the declination of the compass. ”

“ Although decorative, the Leardo map lacks many of the pictorial elements—animals, birds, preposterous monsters—that enliven the blank spaces on other medieval maps. With the exception of the eight wind faces and the symbolic figures of the evangelists no living creatures, whether animals or men, are graphically represented. ”

“ On the Este map the eastern gulf is not as prominent as that of Leardo’s map, but the western is even deeper. Kretschmer suggests that these features have sprung from a combination of the ancient doctrine of a vast austral continent with Ptolemy’s theory that the Indian Ocean is surrounded by land. [23] Certain Arabic maps show an eastward projection of Africa like those of the Este map and Leardo, although they do not indicate anything corresponding to the western gulf.
Prester John’s castle (299) bulks large in the interior of Africa. ”

“ In proportion to the amount of light passing the negative there will be a reaction in the chromated gelatin. In this reaction the gelatin loses its power of absorbing water and takes on the opposite property of holding “non-watery” substances, such as printing ink. The action of the light is a graded one, varying from full effect under the clear parts of the negative to nil under the very dense parts. A similar gradation in ink-retaining powers is acquired by the exposed gelatin film. ”

“ In its general outlines it is so strikingly like a Catalan map of about 1450 now preserved in the Este Library at Modena [18] that we must assume a common cartographic ancestor at no great distance back. There are, however, certain legends on the Este map that Leardo does not give, particularly the long inscriptions and a multitude of place names on the Mediterranean and Atlantic coasts. Leardo’s map, on the other hand, has features not shown on the Este map. ”

“ Among the existing maps dating from the fourteenth and early fifteenth centuries our Leardo map is very closely related to the group of maps drawn by the famous Catalan cartographers of Majorca in the Balearic Islands. ”

“ Leardo presumably had it in mind 8 and did not intend to represent either a flat disk or a complete hemisphere but merely a circular portion of the earth’s surface lying north of the equator.
In its orientation, with east and the Terrestrial Paradise at the top and with Jerusalem at the center, the map follows the Christian tradition of the earlier Middle Ages. Other features reflecting the influence of the Scriptures are Noah’s Ark resting on top of Mt. Ararat, Mt. Sinai, the exaggerated length of the River Jordan, and an inscription in the far northeast referring to Gog and Magog. ”

“ As the last negative comprehends almost the entire base of the map, special attention was devoted to its conversion into a printing plate. The process employed is known in Germany as “Albertype” or “Lichtdruck,” in England as “collotype,” and in America as “heliotype” or “photogelatin.” Of these names, “collotype” seems to be the most fitting. Briefly, this process consists of sensitizing a gelatin film with a chromic salt and 72 exposing it to light under a negative. ”

“ In the twelfth century, reports spread through Europe of the vast realm of a fabulous Christian monarch in the heart of Asia. By the fourteenth century, however, Prester John’s empire had been transferred to Africa, where it became associated with the Christian kingdom of Abyssinia. The elaborate edifice with which Leardo represents Prester John’s empire may be intended for the sumptuous palace described in the thirteenth-century Letter of Prester John.
Like most medieval cartographers, Leardo makes the Nile (312) rise in West Africa (338) . ”

“ On the Catalan maps the trumpeters themselves are shown with their trumpets.
Immediately west of the statues appears “Mount Tanacomedo” (48) , an amusing instance of Leardo’s carelessness; he has here evidently copied “Montana Comedorum” from a Ptolemaic map, combining the last part of the first word with the first part of the last! At the extreme eastern edge of the world disk we see the Terrestrial Paradise (63) surrounded by an enormous wall to keep out curious intruders. The River Indus flows southwestward to a great delta near the entrance of the Persian Gulf (84) . ”

“ Like the Leardo map of 1452, the map of Walsperger, 1448, reveals Ptolemaic influence in some of its names although all the topographical features are strictly medieval. The Genoese world map of 1447 in its elliptical form is the result of a more serious attempt to reconcile the Ptolemaic geography with the traditional views. See Kretschmer, CE, pp. 76-77; on the Walsperger map, Kretschmer, Eine neue mittelalterliche Weltkarte der vatikanischen Bibliothek, in Zeitschr. ”

“ Inside the northern half of this θ a legend tells us that “this is the province of Gog and Magog, where many tribes of the Jews were shut in” (70) , referring to the medieval tradition that Alexander the Great enclosed Gog and Magog—the terrible hordes of Antichrist—within the Caspian Mountains. On many maps the mountains of Gog and Magog in the Far East are named thus. Leardo, however, places “Mo Gaspio” (Caspiae Montes) (4) north of the Caspian Sea somewhat nearer the position at which Ptolemy had placed them. ”

“ Macrobius, Commentaria in somnium Scipionis, I, 20: 20, gives the diameter of the earth as 80,000 stades, which might, if converted into Arabic miles, be approximately the 6857 miles of Leardo. According to Macrobius the radius of the sun’s orbit is 4,800,000 stades (ibid., I, 20: 21) ; the diameter of the sun’s orbit would therefore be 9,600,000 stades, or 120 times that of the earth. The diameter of the sun’s orbit according to Leardo is 218 times that of the earth. On the authority of Porphyry, Macrobius (ibid., II, 3: 14) gives the relative distances between the planets ”

“ Thus, where the light exerts full effect the gelatin will be completely hardened and will hold the ink in its greatest intensity (solid) ; the parts which receive less light or none at all will hold the ink in attenuated quantity. The lights and shades of the monochrome picture are thus reproduced.
In order that the film may exercise this selective power of taking on or rejecting ink it is necessary that the unaltered parts be kept moist. ”

“ Although the Society’s map is not, perhaps, one of the great, outstanding monuments of medieval cartography, the assertion of Theobald Fischer (Sammlung mittelalterlicher Welt- und Seekarten, Venice, 1886, p. 104) that the Leardo maps of 1448 and 1452 were “von geringem Wert,” seems too harsh.
[6] There follows a transcription of this legend. Missing passages supplied from the Vicenza map as transcribed on Santarem’s reproduction are given in square brackets: ... ”

“ Marco Polo adds that at the time of the funeral of Mangou Khan 20,000 persons were thus slain! The actual place of burial of the Mongol Khans was in Cathay, far away from northern Russia where Leardo, following 11 the model of Catalan maps, draws it. ”

“ Nordenskiöld, Periplus: A. E. Nordenskiöld, Periplus, an Essay on the Early History of Charts and Sailing-Directions, transl. by F. A. Bather, Stockholm, 1897.
66 Piz.: Francesco Pizigano’s map, 1367, in National Library, Parma. Copy in [E.-F.] Jomard, Les monuments de la géographie, ou recueil d’anciennes cartes.... Paris, [1862] .
See Kret., Port., pp. 121-122.
Polo: Marco Polo, The Book of Ser Marco Polo the Venetian Concerning the Kingdoms and Marvels of the East, translated and edited with notes by Sir Henry Yule, 3rd edition revised by Henri Cordier, 2 vols., London, 1903. ”

“ The Baltic Sea (577) and Scandinavia are drawn much as on the Este map.
21 NOTES
[1] Giuseppe Crivellari, Alcuni cimeli della cartografia medievale esistenti a Verona, Florence, 1903, pp. 5-28.
[2] This map was discovered by Vincenzo Lazari in 1850. A detailed description and interpretation of it will be found in Santarem, Vol. 3, pp. 398-442 [fuller bibliographical details regarding this and other abbreviated references in these notes will be found on pp. 63-67] ; black and white reproduction in Santarem’s Atlas, Part 3, No. 49; also in A. E. Nordenskiöld, Periplus, p. 61. ”

“ Legend Between Rivers Ras and Tanai
41 Idolatri: On CE a legend applying to city of Castrema (see 15) explains that idolaters there worship a metal idol without head or hands (Kret., CE, 210) .
II. Far Eastern Asia
The surface of the map northwest of the Terrestrial Paradise has been rubbed in such a way that many of the names are illegible.
Mountains
The mountain system here corresponds essentially with that of CE; Ptolemaic names have been given to mountains and rivers.
42 sa ... s (?) :=?
43 Mo. osmire (?) : Asmiraei Montes in 36 Serica, Ptol. ”