Apianus, Peter.

Tipus Orbis Universalis Ivxta Ptolomei Cosmographi Tradi-tionem et Americi Vespucii 1520. [Delineation of the entire world prepared according to the teaching of Ptolemy the cosmographer, and the voyages of Americus Vespuccius and others. ]

      [Vienna, 1520. ]. Very good. No dust jacket. Folio double-page woodcut map of the world. Short tears, neat repairs, margins reinforced at left and bottom with two words outside the map rule renewed, some minor spotting and marginal staining. Rare. FIRST EDITION of the earliest obtainable map to name America (Burden, The Mapping of North America). A true renaissance man, Peter Bienewitz (Apianus) was an astronomer, mathematician, cartographer, and printer. His Introduction to Cosmography (1524), a classic of the age of exploration, was the first geographical work of importance in which the experiences of the discovery of the new world were used. The 1520 Apianus map is based upon the Ptolemaic tradition, but it is enhanced with information from the voyages of Columbus and Amerigo Vespucci. Columbus s voyages in the 1490s are reflected in this map in its printed note, Anno 1497 hec terra cum adiacetibo insulis inuenta est per Columbum Ianuensem ex mandato Regis Castello. Apianus collected the most up-to-date cartographical knowledge and produced a cordiform (heart-shaped) world map with the New World labeled America. The map later appeared in various forms in Apianus s widely circulated published works. For nearly 400 years, this map was known as the source of the term America, from the explorer Amerigo Vespucci. Its source has since proved to be the lone surviving example of the 1507 Waldseemüller wall map, recently acquired by the Library of Congress for $10, 000, 000. No manuscript or printed maps of the New World before 1500 have survived, and only a handful of relics naming America survive from the period of 1520 and earlier. Other than the 1507 Waldsee-müller wall map, there are two maps by Cornelius Aurelius (perhaps from 1514) and a handful of globe gores by two early makers. These virtually unobtainable examples were lost to scholars and the public for centuries, while the great 1520 Apianus map forever established America as the name of the New World. Opportunities to acquire significant relics of the earliest period of the cartography and exploration of the Americas are rare.