Mapping North America

Part III: The Map of Martin Waldseemüller

There exist today maps predating the 1507 publication date of Martin Waldseemüller’s Universalis Cosmographia that demonstrate awareness of new lands to the west of the Old World, but the Waldseemüller map embodies the completion of the transition to a new conceptualization of the face of the planet. Most earlier large world maps were included in private manuscripts, but the Universalis Cosmographia was engraved, printed and sold to the general public in a an original issue of about 1,000 copies, a statistic that magnifies the historical significance of the creation of this map. Additionally, it was the earliest map we are aware of that used the name “America”.

Juan de la Cosa’s map of 1500 showed South and North America as vaguely defined but continuous landmasses, and left unresolved the questions of where and if they were attached to the Asian continent. The Cantino planisphere of 1502 and the Caveri World Map of 1504-1505 added named locations on the conjectured mainland, and seem to have intended to include Florida. Waldseemüller set his world map on a classic foundation in the form of Ptolemy’s world map and built on it by adding discoveries included in the more recent maps. He then brought his map forward into a new era by incorporating claims made in the name of Amerigo Vespucci that across the Atlantic Ocean was something more than just a few islands or a mere extension of the Asian landmass. The Universalis Cosmographia was the first map to show the discoveries in the New World as belonging to a complete, almost entirely unexplored continent, separated from China by thousands of miles of ocean.

This map was published six years before Vasco Núñez de Balboa’s crossing of the Isthmus of Panama to the Pacific Ocean in 1513, and fifteen years before Ferdinand Magellan’s crew arrived in Spain in 1522 with a first-hand report as to the vastness of the Pacific.

Waldseemüller’s 1507 wall map consisted of twelve panels printed from wood engravings measuring approximately 21 by 30 inches each, with the assembled map spanning 54 by 96 inches. Also published in that year by Waldseemüller and his associates was a printed globe, an explanatory guide to the wall map entitled Cosmographiae Introductio and a translation to Latin of a letter which had apparently been written by the famous explorer Amerigo Vespucci.

Shown here are the two top-center panels. The map making custom of showing the new and old worlds in two hemispheres was established with these two inset maps, whose accuracy surpassed that of all predecessors of which we are aware. Alongside the insets are stylized portraits of Claudius Ptolemy (left) and Amerigo Vespucci (right), signifying that the contents of the map should be considered valuable and worthy in the eyes of traditionalists and those keen to learn about the latest discoveries.

The three frames at the western edge showed the American continent as a separate landmass.

The frame in the southwest corner contains the first appearance of the name America.

The “Third Voyage” of Amerigo Vespucci

The name and alleged deeds of Amerigo Vespucci became widely known in Europe after two letters attributed to him were published between 1502 and 1504. Mundus Novus described a voyage to South America in 1501-1502 and was published, reprinted and distributed in numerous European countries. Lettera di Amerigo Vespucci delle isole nuovamente trovate in quattro suoi viaggi (Letter of Amerigo Vespucci concerning the isles newly discovered on his four voyages) claimed to be an account of four voyages to the Americas made by Vespucci between 1497 and 1504. Accompanying the publication of Martin Waldseemüller’s 1507 world map was a translation into Latin of the second letter, as Quattuor Americi Vespuccij navigationes (Four Voyages of Amerigo Vespucci).

Of those “four voyages”, only two were accepted with confidence by historians as having actually occurred. The “second” and “third” voyages are understood to have been real events, and it was on the “third voyage” that Amerigo Vespucci apparently came to a very great realization, namely that he was exploring a previously unknown fourth continent, after Europe, Asia, and Africa.

Upon reaching the coast of Brazil, Vespucci and his companions sailed south along the coast of South America at least as far as present-day Rio de Janeiro, and possibly even further south. After returning to Lisbon, Vespucci wrote that the land masses they explored were much larger than had been anticipated, different in shape from the Asian Continent of Ptolemy’s Geographia and of a character completely unlike the Far Eastern civilization described in The Travels of Marco Polo. On this basis he asserted that he and contemporaneous Spanish and Portuguese explorers must have stumbled upon a New World.

The Travels of Marco Polo was one of the most widely-read texts of the Middle Ages. It had created a European idea of the Orient as a land of spices and silks, with a developed civilization populating huge cities boasting ornate palaces, large public works and busy seaports, all ruled by a powerful king whose dominion extended from the China Sea to the Caspian Sea. The Brazilian coastal region explored by Vespucci simply could not be reconciled with this commonly accepted vision of the Far East.

Thanks to the publication in Vespucci’s name of the two letters mentioned above, he was a man of great stature when Waldseemuller’s map was published. It seemed only fitting that the new continent should be named after the great explorer and “America” was written on the drawing of the southern part of the continent. The map and accompanying book were very influential and widely copied, so the name entered common use and remained in common use even after some of the claims in Vespucci’s name were later challenged.