TITLE:Noua et integri universi orbis descriptio [
Paris Gilt or De Bure Globe ] DATE: ca. 1528 AUTHOR: unknown DESCRIPTION: This hollow sphere is made of copper gilt and very neatly
engraved with names and inscriptions (nearly all Latin) in small capitals
artistically stamped with a puncheon. The globe bears neither date, name
of maker, place of construction, dedication, nor coast of arms, and is unmounted
- hanging by a string passed through a hole pierced from pole to pole. The
name De Bure Globe is derived from a former owner of the l9th century,
the Paris Gilt Globe label results from its present residence and
its very bright and gilt surface. Harrisse reports a lesser known label
of Burton Globe, also from a former owner.
If it might, for the moment, be assumed that the Gilt Globewas of the year
1528, it would have a claim to the earliest known derived cartographical
productions to carry on the Verrazzanian coastal conception. A description
of some of its features is of interest. Its American coastline depicts without
question the Verrazzano exploration of 1524, but without the large false
sea (Slide #333). It displays a coast running uninterruptedly north by east
from the tip of Florida to about 60° N where it makes a virtual right-angled
change of direction, showing thereafter a long coast stretching almost due
east. The apex of this angle lies within an indentation which suggests a
river mouth, while in the sea to the south of that feature are placed two
sizable islands. Westward of the north by east coast and well in the interior
is the legend Terra Francesca nuper lustrata [the Land of Francis
lately explored]. This legend represents a grouping of words which strongly
indicates at least an acquaintance of the globe maker with Maggiolo's map
of 1527 (Slide #329), or with a derivative of it. Maggiolo had been influenced
in his turn either by a lost map made by the explorer Verrazzano, or by
the latter's own statement in the Cellere Codex annotation in which
he wrote of this area that all the land we found was called Francesca after
out Francis. Jacques Cartier explored those shores in 1534; but if the words
nuper lustrata did refer to his first voyage, the Pacific coast in
this most elaborate and detailed globe, would, like the maps of Ribeiro
(1529, Slide #332) and others anterior to 1534, mention Tumbez [Peru],
a country from which Francisco Pizarro had brought to Spain, in the spring
of 1528, most marvellous accounts, immediately printed in Germany and Italy,
and vases of solid gold. It should be noted that the designation of Francesca,
as applied to the present site of New England, or of New York, was inscribed
on maps, and adorned with a French flag, seven years at least before the
first expedition of Cartier. Nuper lustrata, therefore according
to Harrisse, applies to a French exploration of the northeast coast of America,
accomplished before 1527. This exploration can only be the transatlantic
voyage of Verrazzano, as no other at or prior to that period under the French
flag is known. Nor would the mere fishing expeditions of Normandy or Breton
have been acknowledged on maps by a display of the royal standard of France,
particularly across the mainland.
The great land area running to the east from the right-angled junction bears
the legend BaccaQQahum RQg. It has been assumed that the river mouth
where the north by east coast meets the east-running coast is New York Bay,
while Baccalearum Reg. is the long coast traversed by Verrazzano
from that point to Cape Breton. The coastline thus delineated ends with
C.Rasum [Cape Race], the easternmost tip of Newfoundland. There is
nothing in Verrazzano's report to Francois I to suggest an extension beyond
Cape Breton, though it seems clear from this source that he took his homeward
departure from Cape Race.
Across the South American continent there is found inscribed America inventa
1497, which betrays the direct influence of the accounts of the four voyages
of Amerigo Vespucci, as published by Martin Waldseemüller in his Cosmographiae
Introductio at St. Die in Lorraine in 1507 (Slide
#312). What corresponds now with the Peruvian region, exhibits also
only one name: Cattigora Prov., which the cartographer doubtless
imagined to be American, as is seen in the word Prov(incia) added
by him, but which is only a remnant of the Ptolemaic nomenclature. The voyage
of Magellan is depicted with a thread-like itinerary, on which, south of
Madagascar, is inscribed: Illa linea ex Sibilla dvcia hispanorvm navigationem
astwndit. The Gulf of Mexico is called Sinvs S. Michaelis, and
the Caribbean Sea, Mare herbidium, evidently on account of the floating
beds of seaweeds found in those regions, and already indicated on that sea
by Juan de la Cosa, under the designation of Sato de uerbos. The
course of the Amazon River is traced to a very long distance, and made to
issue in several wide streams from a range of high mountains. To the south,
a continuous belt of antarctic lands encompasses the South Pole, and bears
the inscription Regio Patalis.
A feature to be noted particularly in this globe is the joining of the New
World discoveries with Asia, north of the equator, precisely as they appear
on the diminutive hemispheres of Franciscus Monachus (Slide #326), and as
has been inferred from Schöner's description of his own globe of 1523,
initiated in the latter. This resemblance makes it incumbent on the scholar
to ascertain the origin of that peculiar configuration in the Gilt Globe.
In other words, was the globe, now lost, which Schöner constructed
in 1523 the prototype of the Gilt Globe ?
Harrisse believes that the Gilt Globe is a derivative either of Schöner's
globe of 1523, or of one which was constructed by him soon after that date.
His opinion is based upon the perfect resemblance existing between the configurations
of the Gilt Globe and those on Schöner's globe of 1533, which Harrisse
assumes to be mainly a repetition of the lost globe of 1523. Another reason
is that the nomenclature on the Gilt Globe is also almost identical with
that of Schoner's globe of 1533, from Terra florida to the Regio
Patalis (Slide #331). The difference exists only in the names of the
northeast coast, where the Lusitana Germanic nomenclature from Florida to
Baccalaos is no longer to be seen on the Schöner globe of 1533. It
is this omission which prompts one to look for the prototype of the Gilt
Globe in an early derivative of Schöner's globe of 1523, rather than
in his globe of 1533 itself. The reason is that, when constructing the globe
of 1523, Schöner gives us clearly to understand that his new geographical
ideas were limited to the regions south of the Tropic of Cancer, and in
the west, where he thought that America was joined to Asia; thus making
the two worlds only one continental landmass. This, necessarily, led him
to connect, on the Atlantic side, the vast countries which he had theretofore
depicted as separate (see Schöner's globe of 1520, Slide
#323), and to set forth an unbroken line of coasts from Labrador to
the Strait of Magellan. But he had no reason, in 1523, for modifying the
Lusitano Germanic nomenclature inscribed along the northeastern section.
The probablity is, therefore that his globe of 1523 exhibited the configurations
and names which we see on the northeast coast of America on the globe of
1533, but that it maintained the Cantinean nomenclature already existing
on all of his former globes, which, for motives as yet unexplained, he omitted
on his globe of 1533, preferring to delineate a nameless coast.
Be that as it may, the prototype of the Gilt Globe dates from about the
year1527, as can be seen from the reference to discoveries accomplished
by the French on the northeast coast of America, and which have been shown
to be the results of Verrazzano's voyage. The Gilt Globe became the progenitor
of an important series of globes and cordiform maps, such as Schöner's
globe of 1533, the Nancy Globe of 1535, the Paris Wooden Globe of
1535 (Slide #338), and the single cordiform map of
Orontius Finaeus (Slide #362.1). All of these "derivatives", in
their overall aspect, North America as an integral part of Asia, forming
a vast nonexistent continent which is best designated as Amer-Asia. As with
the Gilt Globe, the Atlantic coastline of this continent shows the continuity
and general features of North America from Florida to Cape BretonNewfoundland
area as traversed and recorded by Verrazzano in 1524, omitting, again, any
indication of the false Verrazzanian Sea. Their makers could not, of course,
reconcile the existence of a great gulf giving access to Cathay with the
fact that Cathay was shown on their productions as an area west of Florida
and integral with it, accessible by overland journey from the Atlantic,
or more easily, by sea from the Gulf of Mexico. Though they showed the Verrazzano
coast they had misunderstood its significance in world geography. Verrazzano
had believed and affirmed that his new land was in no sense a part of the
Asian continent. The anonymous globe makers, as well as Franciscus Monachus,
Orontius Fineaus, and others of the period, presented a direct contradiction
to his conclusion as to the separateness of the continents.
The workmanship and gilding of this globe is excellent, and such as might
have been executed in Italy, France, or Germany, during the first half of
the 16th centuryj but from the formation of the letters, which, as has been
mentioned, were punched, and not engraved, scholars are unabled to state
positively where it was constructed. A lapsus from the engraver, however,
permits us to consider the globe as the work of a German artist. All the
names and legends are in the Latin language, with these three exceptions:
where we should read, Aquae Pannanicae, Brunsviga and Vindobona,
the cosmographer has unconsciously caused the artist to inscribe, in German:
Baden, Braunschweig, and Wien.
LOCATION:
REFERENCES:
*Harrisse, H., Discovery of North America, pp. 562-568.
Wroth, L.C.,The Voyages of Giovanni da Verrazzano, 1524-28, pp. 180-182.