IIIF Color HighRes
National Institute of Informatics - Digital Silk Road Project
| |||||||||
|
| IIIF Color HighRes |
| The Book of Ser Marco Polo : vol.1 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Citation Information
POLO'S INFLUENCE ON GEOGRAPHY
137
Caramoran and Oman (a misreading of Polo's Quian), Quinsay
and Mangi.
86. The Maps of Mercator (1587) and Magini (1597) are
similar in character, but more elaborate, introducing China as
a separate system. Such indeed also is Blaeu's Map Gradual(1663) excepting that Ptolemy 's contributions are anceisap opfear-
Polo's no-
reduced to one or two. menclature.
In Sanson's Map (1659) the data of Polo and the media val
Travellers are more cautiously handled, but a new element
of confusion is introduced in the form of numerous features
derived from Edrisi.
It is scarcely worth while to follow the matter further.
With the increase of knowledge of Northern Asia from the
Russian side, and that of China from the Maps of Martini,
followed by the surveys of the Jesuits, and with the real
science brought to bear on Asiatic Geography by such men
as De l'Isle and D'Anville, mere traditional nomenclature
gradually disappeared. And the task which the study of
Polo has provided for the geographers of later days has
been chiefly that of determining the true localities that his
book describes under obsolete or corrupted names.
[My late illustrious friend, Baron A. E. Nordenskiöld, who has
devoted much time and labour to the study of Marco Polo (see
his Periplus, Stockholm, 1897), and published a facsimile edition
of one of the French MSS. kept in the Stockholm Royal Library
(see vol. ii. Bibliography, p. 570), has given to The Geographical
Journal for April, 1899, pp. 396-406, a paper on The Influence of
the " Travels of Marco Polo " on Jacobo Gastaldi's Maps of Asia.
He writes (p. 398) that as far as he knows, none " of the many
learned men who have devoted their attention to the discoveries
of Marco Polo, have been able to refer to any maps in which
all or almost all those places mentioned by Marco Polo are given.
All friends of the history of geography will therefore be glad
to hear that such an atlas from the middle of the sixteenth
century really does exist, viz. Gastaldi's ` Prima, seconda e terza
parte dell Asia.' " All the names of places in Ramusio's Marco
Polo are introduced in the maps of Asia of Jacobo Gastaldi
(1561). Cf. Periplus, liv., lv., and lvi.
I may refer to what both Yule and myself say supra of the
Catalan Map. H. C.]
VOL. I, q
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Copyright (C) 2003-2019 National Institute of Informatics and The Toyo Bunko. All Rights Reserved.