vespucci’ laurētio petri francisci de medicis Salutem plurimā dicit_,
of which a fac-simile of the title is annexed, and which bears the
imprint of Jehan Lambert.[507] It is a small plaquette of six leaves;
and there are copies in the Lenox and Carter-Brown collections.
D’Avezac, and Harrisse, in his later opinion (_Additions_, p. 19),
agree in supposing this the first edition. The dated (1504) Augsburg
edition, _Mundus novus_, is called “extraordinarily rare” by Grenville,
who had a copy, now in the British Museum. On the reverse of the fourth
and last leaf we read: “Magister Johānes otmar: vindelice impressit
Auguste Anno millesimo quingentesimo quarto.” There are copies in the
Lenox and Carter-Brown libraries.[508] An edition, _Mundus novus_,
whose four unnumbered leaves, forty lines to the full page, correspond
wholly with this last issue, except that for the dated colophon the
words LAUS DEO are substituted, was put at first by Harrisse[509] at
the head of the list, with this title. There is a copy in the Lenox
Library, which has another issue, _Mundus novus_, also in black-letter,
forty-two lines to the page;[510] still another, _Mundus novus_, forty
lines to the page;[511] and another, with the words _Mundus novus_ in
Roman, of eight leaves, thirty lines to the page.[512] At this point
in his enumeration Harrisse placed originally the Jehan Lambert issue
(mentioned above), and after it a _Mundus novus_ printed in Paris by
Denys Roce, of which only a fragment (five leaves) exists, sold in the
Libri sale in London, 1865, and now in the British Museum.[513] Another
Paris edition, _Mundus novus_, printed by Gilles de Gourmont, eight
leaves, thirty-one lines to the page, is, according to Harrisse,[514]
known only in a copy in the Lenox Library; but D’Avezac refers to a
copy in the National Library in Paris.[515]
[Illustration: FIRST PAGE OF MUNDUS NOVUS.
Harrisse, no. 29. Cf. Navarrete, _Opúsculos_ i. 99.]
Another _Mundus novus_ is supposed by Harrisse to have been printed
somewhere in the lower Rhineland, and to bear the mark of Wm.
Vorsterman, of Antwerp, on the last leaf, merely to give it currency
in the Netherlands. It has four leaves, and forty-four lines to
the full page. There are copies in the Lenox and Harvard College
libraries.[516] The _Serapeum_ for January, 1861, describes a _Mundus
novus_ as preserved in the Mercantile Library at Hamburg,—a plaquette
of four leaves, with forty-five lines to the page,—which seems to
differ from all others.[517] Later, in his _Additions_ (1872), Harrisse
described other issues of the _Novus mundus_ which do not seem to
be identical with those mentioned in his _Bibliotheca Americana
Vetustissima_. One of these—_Mūdus novus_, printed in a very small
gothic letter, four leaves—he found in the Biblioteca Cosatenense at
Rome.[518] The other has for the leading title, _Epistola Albericii: de
novo mundo_,—a plaquette of four leaves, forty-eight lines to the page,
with map and woodcut.[519]
This letter of Vespucius was again issued at Strasburg in 1505, with
the title _Be [De] ora antarctica_, as shown in the annexed fac-simile;
and joined with this text, in the little six-leaved tract, was a letter
of Philesius to Bruno, and some Latin verses by Philesius; and in this
form we have it probably for the last time in that language.[520] This
Philesius we shall encounter again later.
[Illustration]
It was this Latin rendering by Giocondo, the architect, as Harrisse
thinks,[521] upon which the Italian text of the _Paesi novamente_
was founded. Varnhagen in his _Amerigo Vespucci, son caractère_ (p.
13), prints side by side this Italian and the Latin text, marking
different readings in the latter. In this same year (1505) the first
German edition was issued at Nuremberg, though it is undated: _Von
der new gefundē Region die wol ein welt genennt mag werden durch den
cristenlichen Künig von Portugall wunnderbarlich erfunden_.[522] The
colophon shows that this German version was made from a copy of the
Latin text brought from Paris in May, 1505: _Ausz latein ist dist
missiue in Teütsch gezogē ausz dem exemplar das von Parisz kam ym maien
monet nach Christi geburt, Funfftzenhundert vnnd Fünffjar. Gedruckt yn
Nüremburg durch Wolffgang Hueber_. The full page of this edition has
thirty-seven lines.
[Illustration: TITLE OF THE DRESDEN COPY.
This follows the fac-simile given in Ruge’s _Geschichte des Zeitalters
der Entdeckungen_, p. 333, of an edition in the Royal Library at
Dresden.]
Another edition, issued the same year (1505), shows a slight change
in the title, _Von der neü gefunden Region so wol ein welt genempt
mag werden, durch den Christēlichen künig, von Portigal wunderbarlich
erfunden_. This is followed by the same cut of the King, and has a
similar colophon. Its full page contains thirty-three lines.[523]
Still another edition of the same year and publisher shows thirty-five
lines to the page, and above the same cut the title reads: _Von der
neu gefunden Region die wol ein welt genent mag werden durch den
Cristenlichen künig von portigal wunderbarlich erfunden_.
[Illustration: FROM THE DRESDEN COPY.
This follows the fac-simile given in Ruge’s _Geschichte des Zeitalters
der Entdeckungen_, p. 334, of the reverse of title of a copy preserved
in the Royal Library at Dresden.]
This is the copy described in the _Carter-Brown Catalogue_ (vol. i. no.
26), and seems to correspond to the copy in the Dresden Library, of
which fac-similes of the title and its reverse are given herewith.[524]
Harrisse[525] cites a copy in the British Museum (Grenville), which has
thirty-five lines to the page, with the title: _Vonderneüw gefunden
Region_, etc. It is without date and place; but Harrisse sets it under
1505, as he does another issue, _Von der Neüwen gefundē Region_, of
which he found a copy in the Royal Library at Munich,[526] and still
another, _Von den Nawen Insulen unnd Landen_, printed at Leipsic.[527]
In 1506 there were two editions,—one published at Strasburg,[528] _Von
den Nüwe Insulē und landen_ (eight leaves); and the other at Leipsic,
_Von den newen Insulen und Landen_ (six leaves).[529]
In 1508 there was, according to Brunet,[530] a Strasburg edition, _Von
den Neüwen Insulen und Landen_. There was also a Dutch edition, _Van
der nieuwer werelt_, etc., printed at Antwerp by Jan van Doesborgh,
which was first made known by Muller, of Amsterdam, through his
_Books on America_ (1872, no. 24). It is a little quarto tract of
eight leaves, without date, printed in gothic type, thirty and
thirty-one lines to the page, with various woodcuts. It came from an
“insignificant library,”—that of the architect Bosschaert,[531]—sold in
1871 in Antwerp, and was bound up with three other tracts of the first
ten years of the sixteenth century. It cost Muller 830 florins, and
subsequently passed into the Carter-Brown Library, and still remains
unique. Muller had placed it between 1506 and 1509; but Mr. Bartlett,
in the _Carter-Brown Catalogue_ (vol. i. no. 38), assigns it to 1508.
Muller had also given a fac-simile of the first page; but only the
cut on that page is reproduced in the _Carter-Brown Catalogue_ (i.
46), as well as a cut showing a group of four Indians, which is on the
reverse of the last leaf. Mr. Carter-Brown printed a fac-simile edition
(twenty-five copies) in 1874 for private distribution.[532]
That portion of the Latin letter which Vespucius addressed to Soderini
on his four voyages differs from the text connected with Giocondo’s
name, and will be found in the various versions of the _Paesi
novamente_ and in Grynæus, as well as in Ramusio (i. 128), Bandini
(p. 100), and Canovai in Italian, and in English in Kerr’s _Voyages_
(vol. iii., 1812, p. 342) and in Lester (p. 223). There are also German
versions in Voss, _Allerälteste Nachricht von den neuen Welt_ (Berlin,
1722), and in Spanish in Navarrete’s Coleccion (iii. 190).
There is another text, the “Relazione,” published by Francesco
Bartolozzi in 1789,[533] after it had long remained in manuscript; it
also is addressed to the same Lorenzo.[534] If the original account as
written by Vespucius himself was in Portuguese and addressed to King
Manoel, it is lost.[535]
* * * * *
Of the Vespucius-Coelho voyage we have only the account which is given
in connection with the other three, in which Vespucius gives May 10
as the date of sailing; but Coelho is known to have started June 10,
with six ships. Varnhagen has identified the harbor, where he left the
shipwrecked crew, with Port Frio.[536] Returning, they reached Lisbon
June 18 (or 28), and on the 4th of the following September Vespucius
dated his account.[537]
* * * * *
If we draw a line from Nancy to Strasburg as the longer side of a
triangle, its apex to the south will fall among the Vosges, where in
a secluded valley lies the town of St.-Dié. What we see there to-day
of man’s work is scarcely a century and a half old; for the place was
burned in 1756, and shortly after rebuilt. In the early part of the
sixteenth century St.-Dié was in the dominion of Duke René of Lorraine.
It had its cathedral and a seminary of learning (under the patronage
of the Duke), and a printing-press had been set up there. The reigning
prince, as an enlightened friend of erudition, had drawn to his college
a number of learned men; and Pico de Mirandola, in addressing a letter
to the editor of the Ptolemy of 1513, expressed surprise that so
scholarly a body of men existed in so obscure a place. Who were these
scholars?
The chief agent of the Duke in the matter seems to have been his
secretary, Walter Lud or Ludd, or Gualterus Ludovicus, as his name
was latinized. The preceding narrative has indicated his position in
this learned community,[538] and has cited the little tractate of four
leaves by him, the importance of which was first discovered, about
twenty years ago, by Henry Stevens,[539] and of which the only copies
at present known are in the British Museum and the Imperial Library
at Vienna.[540] From this tiny _Speculum_, as we shall see, we learn
some important particulars. Just over the line of Lorraine, and within
the limits of Alsace, there was born and had lived a certain Mathias
Ringmann or Ringman. In these early years of the century (1504) he was
a student in Paris among the pupils of a certain Dr. John Faber,—to be
in other ways, as we shall see, connected with the development of the
little story now in progress. In Paris at the same time, and engaged
in building the Notre Dame bridge, was the Veronese architect Fra
Giovanni Giocondo. Major thinks there is great reason for believing
that the young Alsatian student formed the acquaintance of the Italian
architect, and was thus brought to entertain that enthusiasm for
Vespucius which Giocondo, as a countryman of the navigator, seems to
have imparted to his young friend. At least the little that is known
positively seems to indicate this transmission of admiration.
* * * * *
We must next revert to what Vespucius himself was doing to afford
material for this increase of his fame. On his return from his last
voyage he had prepared an account at full length of his experiences in
the New World, “that coming generations might remember him.” No such
ample document, however, is now known. There was at this time (1504)
living in Florence a man of fifty-four, Piero Soderini, who two years
before, had been made perpetual Gonfaloniere of the city. He had been a
schoolmate of Vespucius; and to him, dating from Lisbon, Sept. 4, 1504,
the navigator addressed an account of what he called his four voyages,
abstracted as is supposed from the larger narrative. The original text
of this abstract is also missing, unless we believe, with Varnhagen,
that the text which he gives in his _Amerigo Vespucci, son caractère_,
etc. (p. 34), printed at Lima in 1865, is such, which he supposes to
have been published at Florence in 1505-1506, since a printed copy of
an Italian text, undated, had been bought by him in Havana (1863) in
the same covers with another tract of 1506.[541] Other commentators
have not placed this Italian tract so early. It has not usually been
placed before 1510.[542] Dr. Court put it before 1512. Harrisse gave
it the date of 1516 because he had found it bound with another tract
of that date; but in his _Additions_, p. xxv, he acknowledges the
reasons inconclusive. Major contends that there is no reason to believe
that any known Italian text antedates the Latin, yet to be mentioned.
This Italian text is called _Lettera di Amerigo Vespucci delle isole
nuovamente trovate in quattro suoi viaggi ... Data in Lisbona a di 4 di
Septembre, 1504_. It is a small quarto of sixteen leaves.[543]
Varnhagen does not question that the early Italian print is the better
text, differing as it does from Bassin’s Latin; and he follows it by
preference in all his arguments. He complains that Bandini and Canovai
reprinted it with many errors.
Ramusio in his first volume had reprinted that part of it which covers
the third and fourth voyage; and it had also been given in French in
the collection of Jean Temporal at Lyons in 1556, known otherwise as
Jean Leon’s (Leo Africanus) _Historiale description de l’Afrique_, with
a preface by Ramusio.[544]
It is Major’s belief that the original text of the abstract intended
for Soderini was written in a sort of composite Spanish-Italian
dialect, such as an Italian long in the service of the Iberian nations
might acquire,[545] and that a copy of it coming into the possession
of Vespucius’ countryman, Giocondo, in Paris, it was by that architect
translated into French, and at Ringmann’s suggestion addressed to René
and intrusted to Ringmann to convey to the Duke, of whom the Alsatian
felt proud, as an enlightened sovereign whose dominions were within
easy reach of his own home. Major also suggests that the preliminary
parts of the narrative, referring to the school-day acquaintance of
Vespucius with the person whom he addressed, while it was true of
Soderini,[546] was not so of René; but, being retained, has given rise
to confusion.[547] Lud tells us only that the letters were sent from
Portugal to René in French, and Waldseemüller says that they were
translated from the Italian to the French, but without telling us
whence they came.
We know, at all events, that Ringmann returned to the Vosges country,
and was invited to become professor of Latin in the new college, where
he taught thereafter, and that he had become known, as was the fashion,
under the Latin name of Philesius, whose verses have already been
referred to. The narrative of Vespucius, whether Ringmann brought it
from Paris, or however it came, was not turned from the French into
Latin by him,[548] but, as Lud informs us, by another canon of the
Cathedral, Jean Bassin de Sandacourt, or Johannes Basinus Sandacurius,
as he appears in Lud’s Latin.
Just before this, in 1504, there had joined the college, as teacher
of geography, another young man who had classicized his name, and was
known as Hylacomylus. It was left, as has been mentioned, for Humboldt
(_Examen critique_, iv. 99) to identify him as Martin Waltzemüller,—who
however preferred to write it Waldseemüller.
It was a project among this St.-Dié coterie to edit Ptolemy,[549] and
illustrate his cosmographical views, just as another coterie at Vienna
were engaged then and later in studying the complemental theories of
Pomponius Mela. Waldseemüller, as the teacher of geography, naturally
assumed control of this undertaking; and the Duke himself so far
encouraged the scheme as to order the engraving of a map to accompany
the exposition of the new discoveries,—the same which is now known as
the Admiral’s map.[550]
In pursuance of these studies Waldseemüller had prepared a little
cosmographical treatise, and this it was now determined to print at the
College Press at St.-Dié. Nothing could better accompany it than the
Latin translation of the Four Voyages of Vespucius and some verses by
Philesius; for Ringmann, as we have seen, was a verse-maker, and had a
local fame as a Latin poet. Accordingly, unless Varnhagen’s theory is
true, which most critics are not inclined to accept, these letters of
Vespucius first got into print, not in their original Italian, but in
a little Latin quarto of Waldseemüller, printed in this obscure nook
of the Vosges. Under the title of _Cosmographiæ introductio_, this
appeared twice, if not oftener, in 1507.[551]
To establish the sequence of the editions of the _Cosmographiæ
introductio_ in 1507[552] is a bibliographical task of some difficulty,
and experts are at variance. D’Avezac (_Waltzemüller_, p. 112) makes
four editions in 1507, and establishes a test for distinguishing them
by taking the first line of the title, together with the date of the
colophon; those of May corresponding to the 25th of April, and those of
September to the 29th of August:—
1. _Cosmographiæ introdu—vij kl’ Maij._
2. _Cosmographiæ introductio—vij kl’ Maij._
3. _Cosmographiæ—iiij kl’ Septembris._
4. _Cosmographiæ introdu—iiij kl’ Septembris._
[Illustration: PTOLEMY’S WORLD.
(_Reduced after map in Bunbury’s Ancient Geography, London_, 1879,
_vol._ ii.)]
The late Henry C. Murphy[553] maintained that nos. 1 and 4 in this
enumeration are simply made up from nos. 2 and 3 (the original May and
September editions), to which a new title,—the same in each case,—with
the substitution of other leaves for the originals of leaves 1, 2,
5, and 6,—also the same in each case,—was given. Harrisse, however,
dissents, and thinks D’Avezac’s no. 1 a genuine first edition. The only
copy of it known[554] was picked up on a Paris quay for a franc by
the geographer Eyriès, which was sold at his death, in 1846, for 160
francs, and again at the Nicholas Yéméniz sale (Lyons, no. 2,676), in
1867, for 2,000 francs. It is now in the Lenox Library.[555]
Of the second of D’Avezac’s types there are several copies known.
Harrisse[556] names the copies in the Lenox, Murphy,[557] and
Carter-Brown[558] collections. There is a record of other copies in
the National Library at Rio Janeiro,[559] in the Royal Library at
Berlin,[560] in the Huth Collection[561] in London, and in the Mazarine
Library in Paris,—a copy which D’Avezac[562] calls “irréprochable.”
Tross held a copy in 1872 for 1,500 francs. Waldseemüller’s name
does not appear in these early May issues, which are little quartos
of fifty-two leaves, twenty-seven lines to the full page, with an
inscription of twelve lines, in Roman type, on the back of the folding
sheet of a skeleton globe.[563]
On the 29th of August (iiij kl’ Septembris) it was reissued, still
without Waldseemüller’s name, of the same size, and fifty-two leaves;
but the folding sheet bears on the reverse an inscription in fifteen
lines. The ordinary title is D’Avezac’s no. 3. Harrisse[564] mentions
the Lenox and Carter-Brown[565] copies; but there are others in Harvard
College Library (formerly the Cooke copy, no. 625, besides an imperfect
copy which belonged to Charles Sumner), in Charles Deane’s Collection,
and in the Barlow Library. The Murphy Library had a copy (no. 680) in
its catalogue, and the house of John Wiley’s Sons advertised a copy in
New York in 1883 for $350.
There are records of copies in Europe,—in the Imperial Library at
Vienna, in the National Library at Paris, and in the Huth Collection
(_Catalogue_, i. 356) in London. D’Avezac (_Waltzemüller_, pp. 54,
55) describes a copy which belonged to Yéméniz, of Lyons. Brockhaus
advertised one in 1861 (Trömel, no. 1). Another was sold in Paris for
2,000 francs in 1867. There was another in the Sobolewski sale (no.
3,769), and one in the Court Catalogue (no. 92). Leclerc, 1878 (no.
599), has advertised one for 500 francs, Harrassowitz, 1881, (no. 309)
one for 1,000 marks, and Rosenthal, of Munich, in 1884 (no. 30) held
one at 3,000 marks. One is also shown in the _Catalogue of the Reserved
and Most Valuable Portion of the Libri Collection_ (no. 15).
The latter portion of the book, embracing the _Quattuor Americi
Vesputii navigationes_, seems to have been issued also separately, and
is still occasionally found.[566]
What seems to have been a composite edition, corresponding to
D’Avezac’s fourth, made up, as Harrisse thinks (_Bibl. Amer. Vet._, no.
47), of the introductory part of D’Avezac’s first and the voyages of
his third edition, is also found, though very rarely. There is a copy
in the Lenox Library of this description, and another, described by
Harrisse, in the Mazarine Library in Paris.[567]
* * * * *
It was in this precious little quarto of 1507, whose complicated issues
we have endeavored to trace, that, in the introductory portion,
Waldseemüller, anonymously to the world, but doubtless with the privity
of his fellow-collegians, proposed in two passages, already quoted,
but here presented in fac-simile, to stand sponsor for the new-named
western world; and with what result we shall see.
[Illustration: TITLE OF THE SEPTEMBER EDITION, 1507.
This is the third edition of D’Avezac’s enumeration.]
It was a strange sensation to name a new continent, or even a hitherto
unknown part of an old one. There was again the same uncertainty of
continental lines as when Europe had been named[568] by the ancients,
for there was now only the vaguest notion of what there was to be
named. Columbus had already died in the belief that he had only touched
the eastern limits of Asia. There is no good reason to believe that
Vespucius himself was of a different mind.[569] So insignificant a gain
to Europe had men come to believe these new islands, compared with the
regions of wealth and spices with which Vasco da Gama and Cabral had
opened trade by the African route, that the advocate and deluded finder
of the western route had died obscurely, with scarcely a record being
made of his departure. A few islands and their savage inhabitants had
scarcely answered the expectation of those who had pictured from Marco
Polo the golden glories of Cathay.
[Illustration: FROM THE COSMOGRAPHIÆ INTRODUCTIO.
That part of the page (sig. C) of the September edition (1507) which
has the reference to America and Vespucius.]
[Illustration: FROM THE COSMOGRAPHIÆ INTRODUCTIO.
That part of the page of the 1507 (September) edition in which the name
of America is proposed for the New World.]
To Columbus himself the new-found regions were only “insulæ Indiæ super
Gangem,”—India east of the Ganges; and the “Indies” which he supposed
he had found, and for whose native races the Asiatic name was borrowed
and continues to abide, remained the Spanish designation of their
possessions therein, though distinguished in time by the expletive
_West_ Indies.[570] It never occurred to the discoverers themselves to
give a new name to regions which they sometimes designated generically
as _Mundus Novus_ or _Alter Orbis_; but it is doubtful as Humboldt
says, if they intended by such designation any further description
than that the parts discovered were newly found, just as Strabo,
Mela, Cadamosto and others had used similar designations.[571] It was
at a much later day, and when the continental character of the New
World was long established, that some Spaniard suggested _Colonia_,
or _Columbiana_; and another, anxious to commemorate the sovereigns
of Castile and Leon, futilely coined the cumbrous designation of
_Fer-Isabelica_.[572] When Columbus and others had followed a long
stretch of the northern coast of South America without finding a break,
and when the volume of water pouring through the mouths of the Orinoco
betokened to his mind a vast interior, it began to be suspected that
the main coast of Asia had been found; and the designation of _Tierra
firme_ was naturally attached to the whole region, of which Paria and
the Pearl coast were distinguishable parts. This designation of Firm
Land was gradually localized as explorations extended, and covered what
later was known as Castilla del Oro; and began to comprehend in the
time of Purchas,[573] for instance, all that extent of coast from Paria
to Costa Rica.[574]
When Cabral in 1500 sighted the shores of Brazil, he gave the name
of _Terra Sanctæ Crucis_ to the new-found region,—the land of the
Holy Cross; and this name continued for some time to mark as much as
was then known of what we now call South America, and we find it in
such early delineations as the Lenox globe and the map of Sylvanus in
1511.[575] It will be remembered that in 1502, after what is called his
third voyage, Vespucius had simply named the same region _Mundus Novus_.
Thus in 1507 there was no general concurrence in the designations
which had been bestowed on these new islands and coasts; and the only
unbroken line which had then been discovered was that stretching
from Honduras well down the eastern coast of South America, if
Vespucius’ statement of having gone to the thirty-second degree of
southern latitude was to be believed. After the exploration of this
coast,—thanks to the skill of Vespucius in sounding his own exploits
and giving them an attractive setting out,[576] aided, probably, by
that fortuitous dispensation of fortune which sometimes awards fame
where it is hardly deserved,—it had come to pass that the name of
Vespucius had, in common report, become better associated than that
of Columbus with the magnitude of the new discoveries. It was not so
strange then as it appears now that the Florentine, rather than the
Genoese, was selected for such continental commemoration. All this
happened to some degree irrespective of the question of priority in
touching Tierra Firme, as turning upon the truth or falsity of the date
1497 assigned to the first of the voyages of Vespucius.
The proposing of a name was easy; the acceptance of it was not so
certain. The little tract had appeared without any responsible voucher.
The press-mark of St.-Dié was not a powerful stamp. The community was
obscure, and it had been invested with what influence it possessed by
the association of Duke René with it.
This did not last long. The Duke died in 1508, and his death put a stop
to the projected edition of Ptolemy and broke up the little press; so
that next year (1509), when Waldseemüller planned a new edition of the
_Cosmographiæ introductio_, it was necessary to commit it to Grüninger
in Strasburg to print. In this edition Waldseemüller first signed
his own name to the preface. Copies of this issue are somewhat less
rare than those of 1507. It is a little tract of thirty-two leaves,
some copies having fourteen, others fifteen, lines on the back of the
folding sheet.[577] The Lenox Library has examples of each.
[Illustration: THE LENOX GLOBE.
A section of the drawing given by Dr. De Costa in his monograph on the
globe, showing the American parts reduced to a plane projection, and
presenting the name of _Terra Sanctæ Crucis_. There is another sketch
on p. 123.]
There are other copies in the Carter-Brown (_Catalogue_, vol. i. no.
40), Barlow, and Harvard College libraries. Another is in the Force
Collection, Library of Congress, and one was sold in the Murphy sale
(no. 681). The copy which belonged to Ferdinand Columbus is still
preserved in Seville; but its annotations do not signify that the
statements in it respecting Vespucius’ discoveries attracted his
attention.[578] It was this edition which Navarrete used when he made
a Spanish version for his _Coleccion_ (iii. 183) D’Avezac used a copy
in the Mazarine Library; and other copies are noted in the Huth (i.
356) and Sunderland (_Catalogue_, vol. v. no. 12,920) collections. The
account of the voyages in this edition was also printed separately in
German as _Diss buchlin saget wie die zwē ... herrē_, etc.[579]
* * * * *
While the Strasburg press was emitting this 1509 edition it was also
printing the sheets of another little tract, the anonymous _Globus
mundi_,[580] of which a fac-simile of the title is annexed, in which it
will be perceived the bit of the New World shown is called “Newe welt,”
and not America, though “America lately discovered” is the designation
given in the text. The credit of the discovery is given unreservedly to
Vespucius, and Columbus is not mentioned.[581]
The breaking up of the press was a serious blow to the little community
at St.-Dié. Ringmann, in the full faith of completing the edition
of Ptolemy which they had in view, had brought from Italy a Greek
manuscript of the old geographer; but the poet was soon to follow his
patron, for, having retired to Schlestadt, his native town, he died
there in 1511 at the early age of twenty-nine. The Ptolemy project,
however, did not fail. Its production was transferred to Strasburg; and
there, in 1513, it appeared, including the series of maps associated
ever since with the name of Hylacomylus, and showing evidences in the
text of the use which had been made of Ringmann’s Greek manuscript.
[Illustration: TITLE OF THE 1509 (STRASBURG) EDITION.]
We look to this book in vain for any attempt to follow up the
conferring of the name of Vespucius on the New World. The two maps
which it contains, showing the recent discoveries, are given in
fac-simile on pages 111 and 112. In one the large region which stands
for South America has no designation; in the other there is supposed to
be some relation to Columbus’ own map, while it bears a legend which
gives to Columbus unequivocally the credit of the discovery of the New
World. It has been contended of late that the earliest cartographical
application of the name is on two globes preserved in the collection of
the Freiherr von Hauslab, in Vienna, one of which (printed) Varnhagen
in his paper on Apianus and Schöner puts under 1509, and the other
(manuscript) under 1513. Weiser in his _Magalhâes-Strasse_ (p. 27)
doubts these dates.[582] The application of the new name, America,
we also find not far from this time, say between 1512 and 1515, in a
manuscript mappemonde (see p. 125) which Major, when he described it in
the _Archæologia_ (xl. p. 1), unhesitatingly ascribed to Leonardo da
Vinci, thinking that he could trace certain relations between Da Vinci
and Vespucius. This map bears distinctly the name _America_ on the
South American continent. Its connection with Da Vinci is now denied.
[Illustration: TITLE OF THE 1509 (STRASBURG) EDITION.]
Not far from the same time a certain undated edition of the
_Cosmographiæ introductio_ appeared at Lyons, though no place is given.
Of this edition there are two copies in the British Museum, and others
in the Lenox and Barlow collections; but they all lack a map,[583]
which is found in a copy first brought to public attention by the
bookseller Tross, of Paris, in 1881,[584] and which is now owned by Mr.
C. H. Kalbfleisch, of New York. Its date is uncertain. Harrisse (_Bibl.
Amer. Vet._, no. 63) placed it first in 1510, but later (_Cabots_,
p. 182) he dated it about 1514, as Tross had already done. D’Avezac
(_Waltzemüller_, p. 123) thinks it could not have been earlier than
1517.[585]
The chief interest of this map to us is the fact that it bears the
words “America noviter reperta” on what stands for South America; and
there is fair ground for supposing that it antedates all other printed
maps yet known which bear this name.
At not far from the same time, fixed in this instance certainly in
1515, we find _America_ on the earliest known globe of Schöner.[586]
Probably printed to accompany this globe, is a rare little tract,
issued the same year (1515) at Nuremberg, under the title of
_Luculentissima quædā terræ totius descriptio_. In this Schöner speaks
of a “fourth part of the globe, named after its discoverer, Americus
Vespucius, a man of sagacious mind, who found it in 1497,” adopting the
controverted date.[587]
Meanwhile the fame of Vespucius was prospering with the Vienna
coterie. One of them, Georg Tanstetter, sometimes called Collimitius,
was editing the _De natura locorum librum_ of Albertus Magnus; and
apparently after the book was printed he made with type a marginal
note, to cite the profession of Vespucius that he had reached to fifty
degrees south, as showing that there was habitable land so far towards
the Southern Pole.[588]
Joachim Watt, or Vadianus, as he was called in his editorial Latin, had
in 1515 adopted the new name of America, and repeated it in 1518, when
he reproduced his letter in his edition of Pomponius Mela, as explained
on another page.[589] Apian had been employed to make the mappemonde
for it, which was to show the new discoveries. The map seems not to
have been finished in time; but when it appeared, two years later
(1520), in the new edition of Solinus, by Camers, though it bore the
name of America on the southern main, it still preserved the legend in
connection therewith which awarded the discovery to Columbus.[590] Watt
now quarrelled with Camers, for they had worked jointly, and their two
books are usually found in one cover, with Apian’s map between them.
Returning to St. Gall, Vadianus practised there as a physician, and
reissued his Mela at Basle in 1522, dedicating it to that Dr. Faber who
had been the teacher of Ringmann in Paris eighteen years before.[591]
In 1522 Lorenz Friess, or Laurentius Phrysius, another of Duke René’s
coterie, a correspondent of Vespucius, published a new edition of
Ptolemy at the Grüninger press in Strasburg, in which the fame of
Columbus and Vespucius is kept up in the usual equalizing way. The
preface, by Thomas Ancuparius, sounds the praises of the Florentine,
ascribing to him the discovery “of what we to-day call America;” the
Admiral’s map, _Tabula Terre Nove_,[592] which Waldseemüller had
published in the 1513 edition, is once more reproduced, with other of
the maps of that edition, re-engraved on a reduced scale. The usual
legend, crediting the discovery to Columbus, is shown in a section of
the map, which is given in another place.[593] Phrysius acknowledges
that the maps are essentially Waldseemüller’s, though they have some
changes and additions; but he adds a new mappemonde of his own, putting
the name America on the great southern main,—the first time of its
appearing in any map of the Ptolemy series. A fac-simile is annexed.
* * * * *
There is thus far absolutely no proof that any one disputed the
essential facts of the discovery by Columbus of the outlying islands
of Asia, as the belief went, or denied him the credit of giving a new
world to the crowns of Aragon and Castile, whether that were Asia
or not. The maps which have come down to us, so far as they record
anything, invariably give Columbus the credit. The detractors and
panegyrists of Vespucius have asserted in turn that he was privy to
the doings at St.-Dié and Strasburg, and that he was not; but proof
is lacking for either proposition. No one can dispute, however, that
he was dead before his name was applied to the new discoveries on any
published map.
If indeed the date of 1497, as given by the St.-Dié publication, was
correct, there might have been ground for adjudging his explorations of
the mainland to have antedated those of Columbus; but the conclusion
is irresistible that either the Spanish authorities did not know that
such a claim had been made, or they deemed the date an error of the
press; since to rely upon the claim would have helped them in their
conflict with the heirs of Columbus, which began the year following
the publication of that claim, or in 1508 and continued to vex all
concerned till 1527; and during all that time Vespucius, as has been
mentioned, is not named in the records of the proceedings. It is
equally hard to believe that Ferdinand Columbus would have passed by a
claim derogating from the fame of his father, if it had come to him as
a positive assertion. That he knew of the St.-Dié tract we have direct
evidence in his possession of a copy of it. That it did not trouble him
we know also with as much confidence as negative testimony can impart;
for we have no knowledge of his noticing it, but instead the positive
assertion of a contemporary that he did not notice it.
The claim for Vespucius, however, was soon to be set up. In 1527
Las Casas began, if we may believe Quintana, the writing of his
_Historia_.[594] It is not easy, however, to fix precisely the year
when he tells us that the belief had become current of Vespucius being
really the first to set his foot on the main. “Amerigo,” he tells us
further,[595] “is said to have placed the name of America on maps,[596]
thus sinfully failing toward the Admiral. If he purposely gave currency
to this belief in his first setting foot on the main, it was a great
wickedness; and if it was not done intentionally, it looks like it.”
Las Casas still makes allowances, and fails of positive accusation,
when again he speaks of “the injustice of Amerigo, or the injustice
perhaps those who printed the _Quattuor navigationes_ appear to have
committed toward the Admiral;” and once more when he says that “foreign
writers call the country America: it ought to be called Columba.” But
he grows more positive as he goes on, when he wonders how Ferdinand
Columbus, who had, as he says, Vespucius’ account, could have found
nothing in it of deceit and injustice to object to.
Who were these “foreign writers?” Stobnicza, of Cracow, in the
_Introductio in Claudii Ptholomei cosmographiā_, which he published in
1512, said: “Et ne soli Ptolomeo laborassem, curavi etiam notas facere
quasdam partes terre ipsi ptolomeo alijsque vetustioribus ignotas que
Amerii vespucij aliorumque lustratione ad nostram noticiam puenere.”
Upon the reverse of folio v., in the chapter “De meridianis,” occurs:
“Similiter in occasu ultra africam & europam magna pars terre quam
ab Americo eius reptore Americam vocant vulgo autem novus mundus
dicitur.” Upon the reverse of folio vii. in the chapter “De partibus
terre” is this: “Non solū aūt pdicte tres ptes nunc sunt lacius
lustrate, verum & alia quata pars ab Americo vesputio sagacis ingenii
viro inventa est, quam ab ipso Americo eius inventore Ameriḡem si a
americi terram sive americā appellari volunt cuius latitudo est sub
tota torrida zona,” etc. These expressions were repeated in the second
edition in 1519.
[Illustration: LAURENTIUS FRISIUS, IN THE PTOLEMY OF 1522 (_westerly
part._)]
Apian in 1524 had accepted the name in his _Cosmographicus liber_, as
he had in an uncertain way, in 1522, in two editions, one printed at
Ratisbon, the other without place, of the tract, _Declaratio et usus
typi cosmographici_, illustrative of his map.[597]
Glareanus in 1529 spoke of the land to the west “quam Americam vocant,”
though he couples the names of Columbus and Vespucius in speaking
of its discovery. Apian and Gemma Phrysius in their _Cosmographia_
of the same year recognize the new name;[598] and Phrysius again in
his _De principiis astronomiæ_, first published at Antwerp in 1530,
gave a chapter (no. xxx.) to “America,” and repeated it in later
editions.[599] Münster in the _Novus orbis_ of 1532 finds that the
extended coast of South America “takes the name of America from
Americus, who discovered it.”[600] We find the name again in the
_Epitome trium terræ partium_ of Vadianus, published at Tiguri in
1534,[601] and in Honter’s _Rudimentorum cosmographiæ libri_, published
at Basle in the same year. When the Spanish sea-manual, Medina’s _Arte
de navegar_, was published in Italian at Venice in 1544, it had a chart
with America on it; and the _De sphæra_ of Cornelius Valerius (Antwerp,
1561) says this fourth part of the world took its name from Americus.
Thus it was manifest that popular belief, outside of Spain, at
least,[602] was, as Las Casas affirms, working at last into false
channels. Of course the time would come when Vespucius, wrongfully
or rightfully, would be charged with promoting this belief. He was
already dead, and could not repel the insinuation. In 1533 this charge
came for the first time in print, so far as we now know, and from one
who had taken his part in spreading the error. It has already been
mentioned how Schöner, in his globe of 1515, and in the little book
which explained that globe, had accepted the name from the coterie of
the Vosges. He still used the name in 1520 in another globe.[603] Now
in 1533, in his _Opusculum geographicum ex diversorum libris ac cartis
summa cura & diligentia collectum, accomodatum ad recenter elaboratum
ab eodem globum decriptionis terrenæ. Ioachimi Camerarii_. _Ex urbe
Norica, ... Anno XXXIII_,[604] he unreservedly charged Vespucius
with fixing his own name upon that region of India Superior which he
believed to be an island.[605]
In 1535, in a new edition of Ptolemy, Servetus repeated the map of
the New World from the editions of 1522 and 1525 which helped to give
further currency to the name of America; but he checks his readers
in his text by saying that those are misled who call the continent
America, since Vespucius never touched it till long after Columbus
had.[606] This cautious statement did not save Servetus from the
disdainful comment of Gomara (1551), who accuses that editor of Ptolemy
of attempting to blacken the name of the Florentine.
It was but an easy process for a euphonious name, once accepted for
a large part of the new discoveries, gradually to be extended until
it covered them all. The discovery of the South Sea by Balboa in
1513 rendered it certain that there was a country of unmistakably
continental extent lying south of the field of Columbus’ observations,
which, though it might prove to be connected with Asia by the Isthmus
of Panama, was still worthy of an independent designation.[607] We
have seen how the Land of the Holy Cross, Paria, and all other names
gave way in recognition of the one man who had best satisfied Europe
that this region had a continental extent. If it be admitted even that
Vespucius was in any way privy to the bestowal of his name upon it,
there was at first no purpose to enlarge the application of such name
beyond this well-recognized coast.
[Illustration: MERCATOR, 1541.
This is the configuration of Mercator’s gores (for a globe) reduced to
Mercator’s subsequently-devised projection.]
That the name went beyond that coast came of one of those shaping
tendencies which are without control. “It was,” as Humboldt says,[608]
“accident, and not fraud and dissensions, which deprived the continent
of America of the name of Columbus.” It was in 1541, and by Mercator
in his printed gores for a globe, that in a cartographical record we
first find the name _America_ extended to cover the entire continent;
for he places the letters AME at Baccalaos, and completed the name
with RICA at the La Plata.[609] Thus the injustice was made perpetual;
and there seems no greater instance of the instability of truth in
the world’s history. Such monstrous perversion could but incite an
indignation which needed a victim,—and it found him in Vespucius. The
intimation of Schöner was magnified in time by everybody, and the
unfortunate date of 1497, as well as the altogether doubtful aspect of
his _Quattuor navigationes_, helped on the accusation. Vespucius stood
in every cyclopædia and history as the personification of baseness
and arrogance;[610] and his treacherous return for the kindness which
Columbus did him in February, 1505, when he gave him a letter of
recommendation to his son Diego,[611] at a time when the Florentine
stood in need of such assistance, was often made to point a moral.
The most emphatic of these accusers, working up his case with every
subsidiary help, has been the Viscount Santarem. He will not admit the
possibility of Vespucius’ ignorance of the movement at St.-Dié. “We are
led to the conclusion,” he says, in summing up, “that the name given
to the new continent after the death of Columbus was the result of a
preconceived plan against his memory, either designedly and with malice
aforethought, or by the secret influence of an extensive patronage
of foreign merchants residing at Seville and elsewhere, dependent on
Vespucius as naval contractor.”[612]
It was not till Humboldt approached the subject in the fourth and fifth
volumes of his _Examen critique de l’histoire et de la géographie
du nouveau monde_ that the great injustice to Vespucius on account
of the greater injustice to Columbus began to be apparent. No one
but Santarem, since Humboldt’s time, has attempted to rehabilitate
the old arguments. Those who are cautious had said before that he
might pardonably have given his name to the long coast-line which
he had tracked, but that he was not responsible for its ultimate
expansion.[613] But Humboldt’s opinion at once prevailed, and he
reviewed and confirmed them in his _Cosmos_.[614] Humboldt’s views are
convincingly and elaborately enforced; but the busy reader may like to
know they are well epitomized by Wiesener in a paper, “Améric Vespuce
et Christophe Colomb: la véritable origine du nom d’Amérique,” which
was published in the _Revue des questions historiques_ (1866), i.
225-252, and translated into English in the _Catholic World_ (1867), v.
611.
The best English authority on this question is Mr. R. H. Major,
who has examined it with both thoroughness and condensation of
statement in his paper on the Da Vinci map in the _Archæologia_,
vol. xl., in his _Prince Henry the Navigator_ (pp. 367-380),[615]
and in his _Discoveries of Prince Henry_, chap. xiv. Harrisse in his
_Bibl. Amer. Vet._, pp. 65, 94, enumerates the contestants on the
question; and Varnhagen, who is never unjust to Columbus, traces in
a summary way the progress in the acceptance of the name of America
in his _Nouvelles recherches sur les derniers voyages du navigateur
Florentin_. In German, Oscar Peschel in his _Geschichte des Zeitalters
der Entdeckungen_ (book ii. chap. 13) has examined the matter with a
scholar’s instincts. The subject was followed by M. Schoetter in a
paper read at the Congrès des Américanistes at Luxemburg in 1877; but
it is not apparent from the abstract of the paper in the _Proceedings_
of that session (p. 357) that any new light was thrown upon the matter.
Professor Jules Marcou would drive the subject beyond the bounds of
any personal associations by establishing the origin of the name in
the native designation (Americ, Amerrique, Amerique) of a range of
mountains in Central America;[616] and Mr. T. H. Lambert, in the
_Bulletin_ of the American Geographical Society (no. 1 of 1883), asks
us to find the origin in the name given by the Peruvians to their
country,—neither of which theories has received or is likely to receive
any considerable acceptance.[617]
[Illustration: APIANUS (_from_ REUSNER’S _Icones_, 1590, p. 175).]
THE BIBLIOGRAPHY
OF
POMPONIUS MELA, SOLINUS, VADIANUS, AND APIANUS.
BY THE EDITOR.
[Illustration: POMPONIUS MELA’S WORLD.
Reduced after map in Bunbury’s _Ancient Geography_ (London, 1879), ii.
368.]
OF Pomponius Mela we know little beyond the fact that he was born in
Spain, not far from Gibraltar, and that he wrote, as seems probable,
his popular geographical treatise in the year 43 A.D.[618] The _editio
princeps_ of this treatise was printed in 1471 at Milan, it is
supposed, by Antonius Zarotus, under the title _Cosmographia_. It was
a small quarto of fifty-nine leaves. Two copies have been sold lately.
The Sunderland copy (no. 10,117) brought £11 5_s._, and has since
been held by Quaritch at £15 15_s._ Another copy was no. 897 in part
iii. of the _Beckford Catalogue_. In 1478 there was an edition, _De
situ orbis_, at Venice (Sunderland, no. 10,118); and in 1482 another
edition, _Cosmographia geographica_, was also published at Venice
(Leclerc, no. 456; Murphy, no. 2,003; D’Avezac, _Géographes Grecs et
Latins_, p. 13). It was called _Cosmographia_ in the edition of 1498
(_Bibl. Amer. Vet., Additions_, no. 8; Huth, iv. 1166); _De orbis situ_
in that of Venice, 1502; _De totius orbis descriptione_ in the Paris
edition of 1507, edited by Geofroy Tory (A. J. Bernard’s _Geofroy Tory,
premier imprimeur royal_, Paris, 1865, p. 81; Carter-Brown, i. 32;
Muller, 1872, no. 2,318; 1877, no. 2,062).
[Illustration: VADIANUS.
Fac-simile of a cut in Reusner’s _Icones_ (Strasburg, 1590), p. 162.]
In 1512 the text of Mela came under new influences. Henry Stevens
(_Bibliotheca geographica_, p. 210) and others have pointed out how
a circle of geographical students at this time were making Vienna a
centre of interest by their interpretation of the views of Mela and
of Solinus, a writer of the third century, whose _Polyhistor_ is a
description of the world known to the ancients. Within this knot of
cosmographers, John Camers undertook the editing of Mela; and his
edition, _De situ orbis_, was printed by Jean Singrein at Vienna in
1512, though it bears neither place nor date (Stevens, _Bibliotheca
geographica_, no. 1,825; D’Avezac, _Géographes Grecs et Latins_, p. 14;
Leclerc, no. 457; Sunderland, no. 10,119). Another Mela of the same
year (1512) is known to have been printed by Weissenburger, presumably
at Nuremberg, and edited by Johannes Cocleius as _Cosmographia Pomponii
Mele: authoris nitidissimi tribus libris digesta: ... compendio
Johannis Coclei Norici adaucta quo geographie principia generaliter
comprehēduntur_ (Weigel, 1877, no. 227; there is a copy in Charles
Deane’s library). In 1517 Mela made a part of the collection of Antonie
Francino at Florence, which was reissued in 1519 and 1526 (D’Avezac, p.
16; Sunderland, nos. 10,121, 10,122).
Meanwhile another student, Joachim Watt, a native of St. Gall, in
Switzerland, now about thirty years old, who had been a student
of Camers, and who is better known by the latinized form of his
name, Vadianus, had, in November, 1514, addressed a letter to
Rudolfus Agricola, in which he adopted the suggestion first made by
Waldseemüller that the forename of Vespucius should be applied to
that part of the New World which we now call Brazil. This letter
was printed at Vienna (1515) in a little tract,—_Habes, Lector,
hoc libello, Rudolphi Agricolæ Junioris Rheti ad Jochimum Vadianum
epistolam_,—now become very rare. It contains also the letter of
Agricola, Sept. 1, 1514, which drew out the response of Vadianus dated
October 16,—Agricola on his part referring to the work on Mela which
was then occupying Vadianus (a copy owned by Stevens, _Bibliotheca
geographica_, no. 2,799, passed into the Huth Library, _Catalogue_, v.
1506. Harrassowitz has since priced a copy, _Catalogue_, List 61, no.
57, at 280 marks).
The _De situ orbis_ of Mela, as edited by Vadianus, came out finally
in 1518, and contained one of the two letters,—that of Vadianus
himself; and it is in this reproduction that writers have usually
referred to its text (Harrisse, _Bibl. Amer. Vet._, no. 92; Murphy,
no. 2,004; Leclerc, no. 458; Sunderland, no. 10,120; Graesse, v. 401;
Carter-Brown, i. 55). Camers also issued at the same time an edition
uniform with the Aldine imprint of Solinus; and this and the Mela are
often found bound together. Two years later (1520) copies of the two
usually have bound up between them the famous cordiform map of Apian
(Petrus Apianus, in the Latin form; Dienewitz, in his vernacular).
This for a long time was considered the earliest engraved map to show
the name of America, which appeared, as the annexed fac-simile shows,
on the representation of South America. There may be some question
if the map equally belongs to the Mela and to the Solinus, for the
two in this edition are usually bound together; yet in a few copies
of this double book, as in the Cranmer copy in the British Museum,
and in the Huth copy (_Catalogue_, iv. 1372), there is a map for each
book. There are copies of the Solinus in the Carter-Brown, Lenox,
Harvard College, Boston Public, and American Antiquarian Society
libraries (cf. Harrisse, _Notes on Columbus_, p. 175; _Bibl. Amer.
Vet._, no. 108; Murphy, no. 2,338; Trübner, 1876, £15 15s.; Weigel,
1877, 240 marks; Calvary, 1883, 250 marks; Leclerc, 1881, no. 2,686,
500 francs; Ellis & White, 1877, £25). The inscription on the map
reads: “Tipus orbis universalis juxta Ptolomei cosmographi traditionem
et Americi Vespucii aliosque lustrationes a Petro Apiano Leysnico
elucbrat. An. Do. M.D.XX.” Harrisse (_Bibl. Amer. Vet., Additions_,
no. 68) cites from Varnhagen’s _Postface aux trois livraisons sur
Vespucci_, a little tract of eight leaves, which is said to be an
exposition of the map to accompany it, called _Declaratio et usus
typi cosmographici_, Ratisbon, 1522. The map was again used in the
first complete edition of Peter Martyr’s _Decades_, when the date was
changed to “M.D.XXX” (Carter-Brown, i. 94; _Bibl. Amer. Vet._, no. 154;
Kunstmann, _Entdeckung Amerikas_, p. 134; Kohl, _Die beiden ältesten
General-Karten von Amerika_, p. 33; Uricoechea, _Mapoteca Colombiana_,
no. 4). Vadianus meanwhile had quarrelled with Camers, and had returned
to St. Gall, and now re-edited his _Mela_, and published it at Basle in
1522 (_Bibl. Amer. Vet._, no. 112; Murphy, no. 2,004**; Carter-Brown,
i. 590; Leclerc, no. 459).
In 1524 Apianus published the first edition of his cosmographical
studies,—a book that for near a century, under various revisions,
maintained a high reputation. The _Cosmographicus liber_ was published
at Landshut in 1524,—a thin quarto with two diagrams showing the New
World, in one of which the designation is “Ameri” for an island; in the
other, “America.” Bibliographers differ as to collation, some giving
fifty-two, and others sixty leaves; and there are evidently different
editions of the same year. The book is usually priced at £5 or £6.
Cf. Harrisse, _Notes on Columbus_, p. 174; _Bibl. Amer. Vet._, no.
127, and _Additions_, p. 87; Carter-Brown, i. 78; Huth, i. 39; Murphy,
no. 93; Sabin, no. 1,738. There is an account of Apianus (born 1495;
died 1551 or 1552) in Clement’s _Bibliographie curieuse_ (Göttingen,
1750-1760). It is in chapter iv. of part ii. of the _Cosmographicus
liber_ that America is mentioned; but there is no intimation of
Columbus having discovered it. Where “Isabella aut Cuba” is spoken of,
is an early instance of conferring the latter name on that island,
after La Cosa’s use of it.
[Illustration: PART OF APIANUS’S MAP, 1520.
There are fac-similes of the entire map in the _Carter-Brown
Catalogue_, i. 69, and in Santarem’s _Atlas_; and on a much
reduced scale in Daly’s _Early Cartography_. Cf. Varnhagen’s _Jo.
Schöner e P. Apianus: Influencia de um e outro e de varios de seus
contemporaneos na adopçăo do nome America; primeiros globos e primeiros
mappas-mundi com este nome; globo de Waltzeemüller, e plaquette
acerca do de Schöner_, Vienna, 1872, privately printed, 61 pp., 100
copies (_Murphy Catalogue_, no. 2,231; Quaritch prices it at about
£1). A recent account of the history of the Vienna presses, _Wiens
Buchdruckergeschichte_ (1883), by Anton Mayer, refers to the edition of
Solinus of 1520 (vol. i. pp. 38, 41), and to the editions of Pomponius
Mela, edited by Vadianus, giving a fac-simile of the title (p. 39) in
one case.
Santarem gives twenty-five editions of Ptolemy between 1511 and 1584
which do not bear the name of America, and three (1522, 1541, and 1552)
which have it. Cf. _Bulletin de la Société de Géographie de Paris_
(1837), vol. viii.]
In 1529 a pupil of Apianus, Gemma Frisius, annotated his master’s work,
when it was published at Antwerp, while an abridgment, _Cosmographiæ
introductio_, was printed the same year (1529) at Ingoldstadt (Sabin,
no. 1,739; Court, no. 21; _Bibl. Amer. Vet._, nos. 148, 149, and
_Additions_, no. 88. There is a copy of the abridgment in Harvard
College Library).
The third edition of _Mela, cum commentariis Vadiani_ appeared at Paris
in 1530, but without maps (cf. Carter-Brown, i. 97; Muller, 1877, no.
2,063; _Bibl. Amer. Vet._, no. 157); and again in 1532. (Sunderland,
no. 10,124; Harrassowitz, list 61, no. 60).
* * * * *
It is not necessary to follow, other than synoptically, the various
subsequent editions of these three representative books, with brief
indications of the changes that they assumed to comport with the now
rapidly advancing knowledge of the New World.
=1533.= Apianus, full or abridged, in Latin, at Venice, at Freiburg,
at Antwerp, at Ingoldstadt, at Paris (Carter-Brown, i. 591; _Bibl.
Amer. Vet._, nos. 179, 202, and _Additions_, no. 100; Sabin, nos.
1,742, 1,757. Some copies have 1532 in the colophon). Apianus printed
this year at Ingoldstadt various tracts in Latin and German on the
instruments used in observations for latitude and longitude (Stevens,
_Bibliotheca geographica_, no. 173, etc). Vadianus, in his _Epitome
trium terræ partium_, published at Tiguri, described America as a part
of Asia (Weigel, 1877, no. 1,574). He dated his preface at St. Gall,
“VII. Kallen. August, M. D. XXXIII.”
=1534.= Apianus in Latin at Venice (_Bibl. Amer. Vet., Additions,_
no. 106). The _Epitome_ of Vadianus in folio, published at Tiguri,
with a map, “Typus cosmographicus universalis, Tiguri, anno M. D.
XXXIIII,” which resembles somewhat that of Finæus, representing the
New World as an island approaching the shape of South America. The
Carter-Brown copy has no map (cf. Huth, v. 1508; Leclerc, no. 586, 130
francs; Carter-Brown, i. 112; Weigel, 1877, no. 1,576; _Bibl. Amer.
Vet._, no. 189). An edition in octavo, without date, is held to be of
the same year. It is usually said to have no map; but Quaritch (no.
12,475) has advertised a copy for £4,—“the only copy he had ever seen
containing the map.” The _Huth Catalogue_, v. 1508, shows a copy with
twelve woodcut maps of two leaves each, and four single leaves of maps
and globes. The part pertaining to America in this edition is pages
544-564, “Insulæ Oceani præcipuæ,” which is considered to belong to
the Asiatic continent (cf. Stevens, 1870, no. 2,179; Muller, 1872, no.
1,551; 1877, no. 3,293; Weigel, 1877, no. 1,575).
=1535.= Apianus, in Latin, at Venice (Sabin, no. 1,743; _Bibl. Amer.
Vet._, no. 202). Vadianus, in Latin, at Antwerp. (_Bibl. Amer. Vet._,
209; Huth, v. 1508; Court, no. 360).
=1536.= An edition of Mela, _De situ orbis_, without place and date,
was printed at Basle, in small octavo, with the corrections of Olive
and Barbaro. Cf. D’Avezac, _Géographes Grecs et Latins_, p. 20;
Sunderland, no. 10,123; Weigel (1877), p. 99.
=1537.= The first Dutch edition of Apianus, _De cosmographie rā Pe
Apianus_, Antwerp, with woodcut of globe on the title. The first of
two small maps shows America. It contains a description of Peru. Cf.
Carter-Brown, i. 121; Muller (1875), no. 2,314.
=1538.= Mela and Solinus, printed by Henri Petri at Basle with large
and small maps, one representing the New World to the east of Asia as
“Terra incognita.” Cf. Harrassowitz (1882), no. 91, p. 2, 60 marks;
D’Avezac, p. 21.
=1539.= An edition of Mela, _De orbis situ_, at Paris (Sunderland, no.
10,124). Apianus’s _Cosmographia per Gemmam Phrysium restituta_, in
small quarto, was published at Antwerp by A. Berckman. A globe on the
titlepage shows the Old World. It has no other map (Carter-Brown, i.
124; Sabin, no. 1,744; _Bibl. Amer. Vet._, nos. 229, 230).
=1540.= An edition of Mela, issued at Paris, has the Orontius Finæus
map of 1531, with the type of the Dedication changed. The Harvard
College copy and one given in Harrassowitz’ _Catalogue_ (81), no.
55, show no map. Cf. Leclerc, no. 460, 200 francs; Harrisse, _Bibl.
Amer. Vet._, no. 230, _Additions_, nos. 126, 127, 460; Court, no. 283;
Rosenthal (1884), no. 51, at 150 marks. An edition of Apianus in Latin
at Antwerp, without map; but Lelewel (_Moyen-âge_, pl. 46) gives a map
purporting to follow one in this edition of Apianus. Cf. Carter-Brown,
i. 125; _Bibl. Amer. Vet._, no. 230; Sabin, no. 1,745.
=1541.= Editions of Apianus in Latin at Venice and at Nuremberg. Cf.
_Bibl. Amer. Vet._, nos. 235, 236; Sabin, nos. 1,746, 1,747.
=1543.= Mela and Solinus at Basle (D’Avezac, p. 21).
[Illustration: APIANUS.
This follows a fac-simile of an old cut given in the _Carter-Brown
Catalogue_, i. 294.]
=1544.= An edition of Apianus in French at Antwerp, with a map, which
was used in various later editions. Cf. Sabin, no. 1,752; Carter-Brown,
i. 592; _Bibl. Amer. Vet._, no. 253.
=1545.= Apianus, in Latin, at Antwerp, with the same map as in the 1544
French edition. Cf. Carter-Brown, i. 135; _Bibl. Amer. Vet._, no. 262;
Muller (1875), no. 2,365 (1877), no. 158; Sabin, no. 1,748.
=1548.= Apianus in Spanish, _Cosmographia augmentada por Gemma Frisio_,
at Antwerp, with the same folding map. Cf. _Bibl. Amer. Vet._, no.
283; Sabin, no. 1,753; Carter-Brown, i. 147; Dufosse, no. 10,201, 45
francs; Quaritch (1878), no. 104, £6 6_s._; _Cat. hist. Brazil, Bibl.
Nac. do Rio de Janeiro_, no. 3. Apianus in Italian at Antwerp, _Libro
de la cosmographia de Pedro Apiano_, with the same map. The _Epitome_
of Vadianus, published at Tiguri, with double maps engraved on wood,
contains one, dated 1546, showing America, which is reproduced in
Santarem’s _Atlas_. Cf. Carter-Brown, i. 151; _Bibl. Amer. Vet._, nos.
170, 464, _Additions_, no. 104.
=1550.= Apianus in Latin at Antwerp, with map at folio 30, with
additions by Frisius; and folios 30-48, on America (cf. Carter-Brown,
i. 154; _Bibl. Amer. Vet._, no. 298; Murphy, no. 94; Sabin, no. 1,749;
Muller, 1875, no. 2,366). Some bibliographers report Latin editions of
this year at Amsterdam and Basle.
=1551.= Editions of Apianus at Paris, in Latin and French, with a
folding map and two smaller ones,—a reprint of the Antwerp edition of
1550. The language of the maps is French in both editions (Court, no.
20). Clement (_Bibliothèque curieuse_, i. 404) gives 1553 as the date
of the colophon. An edition of Mela and Solinus (D’Avezac, p. 21).
=1553.= Editions of Apianus in Latin at Antwerp and Paris, and in Dutch
at Antwerp, with mappemonde and two small maps. Cf. Carter-Brown, i.
174, 594. Some copies have 1551 in the colophon, as does that belonging
to Jules Marcou, of Cambridge. There is a copy of the Paris edition in
the Boston Public Library, no. 2,285, 58.
=1554.= An abridged edition of Apianus, _Cosmographiæ introductio_,
Venice. A copy in Harvard College Library.
=1556.= An edition of Mela, at Paris (Sunderland, no. 10,125).
=1557.= An edition of Mela, as edited by Vadianus, at Basle (D’Avezac,
p. 21).
=1561.= A Dutch edition of Apianus, at Antwerp, without map. Cf.
Carter-Brown, i. 597; Sabin, no. 1,754.
=1564.= An octavo edition of Vadianus’ _Mela_ (D’Avezac, p. 21). A
Latin edition of Apianus at Antwerp, with mappemonde.
=1574.= Latin editions of Apianus at Antwerp and Cologne, with a
folding mappemonde (Carter-Brown, i. 296, 297; Sabin, no. 1,750).
=1575.= Spanish and Italian texts of Apianus published at Antwerp,
with mappemonde, and descriptions of the New World taken from Gomara
and Girava. Cf. Carter-Brown, i. 302; Sabin, no. 1,756; Clement,
_Bibliothèque curieuse_, i. 405.
=1576.= Mela, as edited by Vadianus (D’Avezac, p. 21). With the
_Polyhistor_ of Solinus, published at Basle. The Harvard College copy
has no map of America. Cf. Graesse, v. 402.
=1577.= Henri Estienne’s collection in quarto, containing Mela
(D’Avezac, p. 24).
=1581.= Apianus in French, at Antwerp, with a folding mappemonde (p.
72). The part on America is pp. 155-187 (Murphy, no. 95).
=1582.= An edition of Mela edited by A. Schottus, published at Antwerp,
with map by Ortelius (Sunderland, no. 10,126).
=1584.= The _Cosmographia_ of Apianus and Frisius, called by Clement
(_Bibliothèque curieuse_, i. 404) the best edition, published at
Antwerp by Bellero, in two issues, a change in the title distinguishing
them. It has the same map with the 1564 and 1574 editions, and the
section on “Insulæ Americæ” begins on p. 157. Cf. Carter-Brown, i. 354,
no map mentioned; Sabin, no. 1,751.
=1585.= An edition of Mela in English, translated by Arthur Golding,
published at London as _The Worke of Pomponius Mela, the Cosmographer,
concerning the Situation of the World_. The preface is dated Feb. 6,
1584, in which Golding promises versions of Solinus and Thevet. There
is a copy in the Library of the Massachusetts Historical Society.
=1592.= A Dutch edition of Apianus, published at Antwerp (Sabin, no.
1,755).
=1595.= An edition of Mela, as edited by Vadianus, published at Basle
(D’Avezac, p. 21).
=1598.= A Dutch edition of Apianus, published at Amsterdam, with
folding map. Cf. Carter-Brown, i. 521; Muller (1877), no. 164.
=1605.= Mathias Bonhomme published an edition of Mela and Solinus
(D’Avezac, p. 21).
=1609.= A Dutch edition of Apianus, printed at Antwerp, with mappemonde
(Carter-Brown, ii. 76; Sabin, no. 1,755). Bonhomme’s edition of Mela
and Solinus, reissued (D’Avezac, p. 21).
=1615=, etc. Numerous editions of Mela appeared subsequently: 1615
(Vadianus), Basle, 1619, 1625, 1626, 1635; at Madrid, 1642, 1644, in
Spanish; Leyden, 1646, in Latin; and under different editors, 1658,
1685, and 1700, and often later.