Dec 05, 2017 - Sale 2464

Sale 2464 - Lot 243

Price Realized: $ 27,500
?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 30,000 - $ 40,000
WALDSEEMÜLLER, MARTIN. Tabula Terre Nove. Double-page woodcut map of the Atlantic Ocean. 17 3/4x24 3/4 inches sheet size, wide margins; minor finger soiling in margins with a faint mat stain, small tear at lower edge, in general an impressive example with little flaw and no restorations. Strasbourg, 1513
Set Alert for Similar Items

Additional Details

Published in Martin Waldseemüller's edition of Claudius Ptolemy's Geographiae in 1513, "This important map is the first devoted to America to appear in an atlas" (Burden.) It also bears the distinction of being the first truly obtainable printed map to illustrate the Americas. The only earlier printed maps to delineate the New World were Peter Martyr d'Anghiera's map of the Spanish Main from 1511 (known in only 10 copies) and Johannes Stobincza's world map of 1512 (known in only 3 copies).

Often termed "the Admiral's map" in response to a reference in Waldseemüller's introduction to the atlas which is traditionally assumed to suggest Christopher Columbus, however there is some debate that the "Admiral" he refers to is in fact Amerigo Vespucci. Nonetheless, in the Terra Incognita of South America appears this inscription: "Hec terra cum adiacent[ibus] insulis inuenta est per Columbu[m] ianuensem ex madata Regis Castelle." ("This land with its adjacent islands was discovered by Columbus, sent by authority of the King of Castile.")

Nearly twenty place names appear on the North American coastline, primarily derived from unrecorded Spanish and Portuguese manuscript sources. There is a sense of the Florida peninsula and the Gulf of Mexico as the landmass extends continuously to the southern continent. Cuba and Hispaniola are prominent and labeled Isabella and Spagnolla for the queen of Spain. Puerto Rico (Borigeum) and Jamaica (Jamaiqua) are interspersed among other Caribbean islands. South America is a massive continent with minimal coastal information and the interior labeled "Terra Incognita"; Western Africa, Iberia and part of England appear at the east side of the Atlantic. Burden 3; Schwartz & Ehrenberg page 34.