Hence, As Dr. Vincent Remarks, It Probably
Contains The Oldest Map Of The World At This Day Extant, Except The
Peutingerian Tables.
Sanuto, as we have already noticed, in giving an
abstract of the commercial information contained in his memorial, lived in
1324.
In the monastery of St. Michael di Murano, there is a planisphere, said to
be drawn up in 1459, by Fra Mauro, which contains a report of a ship from
India having passed the extreme point south, 2000 miles towards the west
and southwest in 1420.
Ramusio describes a map, supposed to be this, which he states to have been
drawn up for the elucidation of Marco Polo's travels.
On this map, so far as it relates to the circumnavigation of Africa, Dr.
Vincent has given a dissertation, having procured a _fac-simile_ copy
from Venice, which is deposited in the British Museum; the substance of
this dissertation we shall here compress. He divides his dissertation into
three parts. First, whether this was the map noticed by Ramusio, and by him
supposed to be drawn up to elucidate the travels of Marco Polo. On this
point he concludes that it was the map referred to by Ramusio, but that his
information respecting it is not correct. The second point to be determined
is, whether the map procured from Venice was really executed by Mauro, and
whether it existed previous to the Portuguese discoveries on the west coast
of Africa. Manro lived in the reign of Alphonso the Fifth, that is between
1438 and 1480; the whole of this map, therefore, is prior to Diaz and Gama,
two celebrated Portuguese navigators.
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