Vogel, Klaus A. (Author)
Der Globusfreund: Wissenschaftliche Zeitschrift für Globen- und Instrumentenkunde
Volume: 57/58
Pages: 83--94
The world map of 1460 from Fra Mauro's school, today one of the major attrac- tions of the Museo Correr and the Bibliotheca Marciana in Venice, is justly consi- dered to be the most important example of occidental cartography just before the onset of overseas discoveries. What kind of image of the earth's shape was the basis of 'Fra Mauro's Map'? What is the connection between 'Fra Mauro's Map' the mo- dern globe concept? The paper discusses the spherical model of the earth on which 'Fra Mauro's Map' is based and explains the map's overall conception, which is outlined in some anno- tations as well as through the treatise On Lifting the Earth out of the Water-Sphere also represented on the map. Aristotle's nature philosophy, Ptolemaic geography and surveys of the known world together contributed to forming the image of half a globe, i.e. a hemisphere lifted out of the water-sphere, with the protruding surface enabling human settlement as well as experiences and descriptions by travellers on land and on sea, and by geographers. Through its ring-shaped massive wooden profile, which encircles the known in- habitable earth and coastal ocean, 'Fra Mauro's Map' depicts the limits of possible geographical experience generally assumed at that time. Only through Christopher Columbus's venture into the open ocean and Amerigo Vespucci's report about the discovery of the overseas antipodes was the former clear borderline of experience transcended that was still undisputed around 1460 among Fra Mauro's contempora- ries. The process of overseas discoveries and their reception in the early 16th century widened the Old World's geography, giving rise to the image of the modern glo- be. This contrasts with 'Fra Mauro's Map', the last important example of the Late Middle Ages' limited geography restricted to only one hemisphere.
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