The Mysterious Waldseemuller Map of 1507

One of the last surviving prints of the mysterious Waldseemuller Map of 1507 goes on display at the Library of Congress on December 13. The map will be displayed in an aluminium case filled with argon gas to prevent damage and deterioration. The twelve sheets that make up the map were printed from engraved wooden blocks.

This copy was found in 1901 in the library of Prince von Waldburg-Wolfsee-Waldsee of Württemberg's Castle of Wolfegg. The map's title translates to mean "A map of the whole world according to the traditions of Ptolemy and of Amerigo Vespucci and of other
surveyors". It was in 1501 that Rene II, the Duke of Lorraine brought the German monk and scholar Martin Waldseemuller and other scholars to the French Saint Die monastery with the purpose of producing a world map.

Besides being innovative for its time, the map has a few features that have left researchers clueless. The Waldseemuller Map of 1507 depicts the continental regions of North and South America and uses the name "America" for the area. On the Waldseemuller Map, there are oceans depicted on each side of this "America". Six years later, in another Waldseemuller map, only the coastlines of North and South America are shown and the area is called "Terra Incognita" which means unknown land. In a 1516 mariner map, Waldseemuller now reconnects the North American land mass with Asia and calls the North American coastline "Terra Nova" which means new world.

Surprisingly, an ocean is depicted on the west side of "America" six years before the explorer and Spanish Conquistador, Vasco Nunez de Balboa made his way to the ocean by land. Another anomaly is the accuracy of South America's shape. The map is off by seventy miles at some important points but that is still very accurate for that time in history especially since you consider that the information contained in the map seems beyond the capabilities of Europeans in the 1500s. Japan's location is also given with a great degree of precision despite the only source of information for its location would have been found in Marco Polo's writings. The map also shows the entire African coastline.

The entire map is finely detailed and is innovative because it shows the earth round with curved meridians. No one had ever seen such a map in those days.

It is a mystery how these early scholars could actually map out the world with such accuracy and at the same time introduce elements into cartography that would change the way maps have been created ever since. The map is being put on display with the hopes that more interest in the subject could drum up more information about the anomalous Waldseemuller Map of 1507.

By: Kim DeLeary
Published: 12/04/07