Benedetto Bordon,<i>Miniator</i>, and cartography in early sixteenth‐century venice

Armstrong, Lilian

doi:10.1080/03085699608592833

Cited by 23 publications

(1 citation statement)

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“…While Buondelmonti, Sonetti, and Piri Reis all made use of their personal experience in creating their island-books, the case is very different with the editor and cartographer Benedetto Bordone (1460-1531). In his Libro di Benedetto Bordone nel qual si ragiona de tutte l'isole del mondo (Venice, 1528), Bordone expanded the geographical coverage of the isolario to include the Atlantic and Indian Oceans (Almagià, 1937;Skelton, 1966;Armstrong, 1996;Lancioni, 2009)., 19 but as he makes clear in the preface, the book is not based on information he gathered on his own voyages among the islands, even within the Mediterranean. In a remarkable contrast to the claims we have seen in other isolarii, Bordone says that he hopes his descriptions of the islands will carry his patron back to his own memories of his naval victories among the islands: Because it seems to me to accomplish something very beneficial, if I make known all of the islands and peninsulas of the world with their ancient and modern names, and with everything else that pertains to them, including some of the histories written about them, and also the fables, and in what part of the sea lie, and the various customs that everyone sailing there sees, and at what latitude, and in which climatic zone they are located; so that in doing this, I think that I make it as if you have carefully observed these things with your eyes, through my writing I have now reduced them to memory, and generated new pleasure in your spirits, carrying you back to the memory of the honors you gained in the mighty armies of the Signori of Venice and the Catholic King, sailing all over the Mediterranean Sea, from many magnanimous lords and valiant knights.…”

Section: Isolariimentioning

confidence: 99%

The Cartographer Sets Sail: Eyewitness Records and Early Modern Maps

Duzer

2021

Cult. Hist. Digit. J.

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In this article I examine early nautical charts and isolarii, or island books illustrated with maps, for evidence that indicates the maps were made on the basis of first-hand observation by the cartographer. There are very few claims on early nautical charts that the charts were created based on the cartographers’ own observations. I suggest that these claims are rare because chart-making was more an artistic enterprise than as a medium for recording discoveries. This conception of nautical charts changed with the advent of the Age of Discoveries, and claims that charts were made based on eyewitness information become more common. The case with isolarii is very different, although the maps in isolarii derive from the nautical chart tradition. Some of the creators of isolarii claim that their works were based on first-hand experience, but not always truthfully. Other authors neither sailed among the islands they describe nor claim to have visited them.

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Section: Isolariimentioning

confidence: 99%