The Avignon Chart (c. 1300–c. 1310): An Early Attempt to Represent the Northern Regions of Europe on a Nautical Chart

ABSTRACT

The Avignon chart, which came to light in 2002, is one of the earliest surviving charts of the Mediterranean area. Despite its fragmentary nature and damage from reuse as a book cover in the sixteenth century, its precocity alone—it is thought to date from between c. 1300 and c. 1310, following only the Pisane (c. 1270) and the Cortona (c. 1300) charts—would be enough to ensure its importance. Researches to date, however, underline its particular significance in the history of medieval chart making. Pending further, multidisciplinary research, the present article draws attention to the main characteristics of the Avignon chart and highlights some of the enigmas of its construction, such as the way the chartmaker manipulated the orientation of the Iberian Peninsula in order to create space at the top to show, for the first time, the northern coastline of mainland Europe as far as the North and Baltic seas. The anonymous creator also constructed a grid to ensure the correct alignment of Britain, whose detailed configuration points to the use of local information among the available geographical sources for, and cultural knowledge about, the island.

La carte d'Avignon, découverte en 2002, est l'une des plus anciennes cartes du bassin Méditerranéen qui nous soit parvenue. Malgré sa nature fragmentaire et les dommages causés par sa réutilisation comme couverture de livre au XVIe siècle, son ancienneté - on pense qu'elle date d'entre 1300 et 1310 environ, juste après la carte Pisane (vers 1270) et celle de Cortone (vers 1300) – suffirait seule à garantir son intérêt. Les recherches menées jusqu'à présent soulignent toutefois son importance particulière dans l'histoire de la cartographie médiévale. Dans l'attente d'une recherche pluridisciplinaire plus approfondie, le présent article attire l'attention sur les principales caractéristiques de la carte d'Avignon et met en lumière certaines des énigmes de sa construction, comme la façon dont le cartographe a manipulé l'orientation de la péninsule ibérique afin de créer de l'espace en haut pour montrer, pour la première fois, la côte nord de l'Europe continentale jusqu'à la mer du Nord et la mer Baltique. Le créateur anonyme a également construit une grille pour s'assurer du positionnement correct des côtes de la Grande-Bretagne, dont la configuration détaillée indique l'utilisation d'informations locales sur l'île, parmi d'autres sources géographiques et culturelles disponibles.

La carta de Aviñón, que salió a la luz en 2002, es una de las más antiguas conservadas de la región del Mediterráneo. A pesar de su estado fragmentario y de los daños causados por su reutilización como cubierta de libro en el siglo XVI, su precocidad por sí sola –se cree que data de entre 1300 y 1310, realizada sólo después de las cartas Pisana (c. 1270) y Cortona (c. 1300)– es garantía suficiente de su importancia. Sin embargo, las investigaciones realizadas hasta la fecha subrayan su singularidad en la historia de la cartografía medieval. A la espera de nuevas investigaciones multidisciplinares, el presente artículo llama la atención sobre las principales características de la carta de Aviñón y destaca algunos de los enigmas de su realización, como el modo en que el cartógrafo manipuló la orientación de la península ibérica para crear espacio en la parte superior y mostrar, por primera vez, la costa septentrional de Europa continental hasta los mares del Norte y Báltico. El autor anónimo también construyó una cuadrícula para asegurar la correcta alineación de Gran Bretaña, y su detallada configuración apunta al uso de información local entre las fuentes geográficas disponibles y al recurso a conocimientos culturales sobre la isla.

Die „Carte d'Avignon“, die 2002 entdeckt wurde, ist eine der ältesten erhaltenen Seekarten des Mittelmeeres. Trotz ihres fragmentarischen Zustands und der Beschädigungen aufgrund ihrer Verwendung als Bucheinband im 16. Jahrhundert, würde allein die frühe Datierung – sie wird zwischen ca. 1300 und ca. 1310, und damit direkt nach der „Carte Pisane“ (ca. 1270) und der „Cortona Karte“ (ca. 1300) eingeordnet – ihr eine große Bedeutung zumessen. Aktuelle Forschungen betonen allerdings ihre darüberhinausgehende Relevanz für die Geschichte der Seekartenherstellung. Unabhängig von weiteren, interdisziplinären Untersuchungen, soll in diesem Artikel auf die wesentlichen Charakteristiken der „Carte d'Avignon“ hingewiesen werden. Zudem können einige Geheimnisse ihrer Konstruktion beleuchtet werden, etwa wie der Kartenzeichner die Orientierung der Iberischen Halbinsel manipulierte, um oberhalb Platz zu schaffen und erstmals die nördlichen Küsten Europas bis zur Ostsee darzustellen. Der anonyme Autor konstruierte zudem ein Gitter, um Britannien korrekt einzupassen. Die detaillierte Zeichnung der Insel zeigt außerdem, dass er lokale Informationen zur Geographie und Kultur der Insel nutzen konnte.

KEYWORDS:

• Drawing grids
• construction techniques
• local information
• cultural knowledge
• locus amoenus
• coastal configuration
• Hanseatic trade routes
• Britain
• portolan charts

Acknowledgements

I owe thanks to many for their help during the gestation of this article, but above all I am grateful to the former editor of this journal (Catherine Delano-Smith) and her editorial team (Mary Alice Lowenthal and Damien Bove), and above all to Emmanuelle Vagnon for her skills, scholarly insight and help with the translation. The combined labour and generosity of all four have transformed a rough text into an essay worthy of Imago Mundi.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1 Archives départementales de Vaucluse (AdV), Avignon chart, c. 1300, Portulan 01 3E 54 Reg 888bis. Notes in a 16th-century hand (verso and lower left corner of the recto) are probably those of the notary whose documents were bound into the discarded parchment.

2 Paul Fermon, ‘Le peintre et la carte: les représentations des espaces locaux dans les documents juridiques et iconographiques entre Alpes et Rhône (début XIVe siècle–début XVIe siècle)’ (PhD thesis, École Pratique des Hautes Études, 2016). Published as Paul Fermon, Le Peintre et la carte. Origines et essor de la vue figurée entre Rhône et Alpes (XIV^e–XV^e siècle) (Turnhout: Brepols, 2018), 46–50.

3 Jacques Mille and Paul Fermon, ‘A recently discovered portolan chart. Maybe one of the oldest extant? The Avignon chart,’ Maps in History 59 (September 2017): 19–25. The unabridged French version is available at, ‘Une carte portulan récemment découverte. Peut-être une des plus anciennes conservées? La carte d’Avignon,’ accessed 27 September 2023, https://www.bimcc.org/history-of-cartography/avignon-chart.

4 International Workshops: ‘On the Origin and Evolution of the Nautical Chart,’ Medea-Chart Project, The Interuniversity Centre for the History of Science (CIUHCT), Lisbon, 2018, 2021, 2023; Jacques Mille, La carte d’Avignon. De la Méditerranée à la Baltique 1190–1490 (Paris: Cherche-bruit, 2021).

5 Tony Campbell, ‘Portolan charts from the late thirteenth century to 1500,’ in The History of Cartography, vol. 1: Cartography in Prehistoric, Ancient and Medieval Europe and the Mediterranean, ed. J. B. Harley and David Woodward (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1987), 371–463; Tony Campbell, ‘A detailed reassessment of the Carte Pisane: A late and inferior copy, or the lone survivor from the portolan charts' formative period?’ accessed 12 October 2023, http://www.maphistory.info/CartePisaneTEXT.html .

6 The Riccardiana chart was probably based on Pietro Vesconte’s work. For an introduction to these charts see both of Campbell references in note 5; and Ramón Pujades i Bataller, Les cartes portolanes: la representació medieval d’una mar solcada (Barcelona: Institut Cartogràfic de Catalunya, 2007). The charts cited have the following shelf marks: BnF, Carte Pisane, c. 1270, GE B-1118 (RES); Bibl. Accad. Etrusca, Cortona chart, c. 1300, Port. 105; Bibl. Riccardiana, Riccardiana chart, c. 1310, ms. 3827; Archivo di Stato di Firenze, Pietro Vesconte, portolan chart, 1311, C.N.1; Bibl. Medicea Laurenziana, Perrino Vesconte, portolan chart, 1327, Med. Palat. 248.

7 Carignano (destroyed); Prince Corsini Collection, Angelino Dulcert [Dalorto], portolan chart, 1330; BnF, Angelino Dulcert, portolan chart, 1339, Ge B 696 RES.

8 See the full analysis from Tony Campbell, as quoted in Mille, La carte d’Avignon, 144–50.

9 I am grateful to Jerome Hayez for the identification of the script. See also Albert Derolez, The Paleography of Gothic Manuscript Books: From the Twelfth to the Early Sixteenth Century (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003).

10 Robert S. Lopez, ‘Majorcans and Genoese on the North Sea route in the thirteenth century,’ Revue belge de philologie et d’histoire 29, no. 4 (1951): 1163–79; David Abulafia, A Mediterranean Emporium: The Catalan Kingdom of Majorca (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994), 190–92; Sabine Lefebvre and Christophe Picard, eds., Le détroit de Gibraltar. A la croisée des mers et des continents (Antiquité–Moyen Âge) (Toulouse: Presses universitaires du Midi—Casa de Velásquez, 2021), 137–41 and 334–39.

11 The suggestion was made by Fermon, Le Peintre et la carte. Origines et essor, 48, quoting Charles de la Roncière, ‘Les portulans italiens,’ in Bibliothèque de la ville de Lyon. Documents paléographiques, typographiques, iconographiques, fasc. 8 (Lyon: Amis de la Bibliothèque de Lyon 1929), 8–10. About Benedetto Zaccaria and the Clos des Galées, see Elisabeth Lalou, ‘La flotte normande à la fin du XIIIe siècle,’ in La guerre en Normandie (XIe–XIVe siècle), ed. Anne Curry and Véronique Gazeau (Caen: Presses Universitaires de Caen, 2018), 73–82.

12 Fridtjof Nansen, In Northern Mists: Arctic Exploration in Early Times, vol. 2 (New York: Frederick A. Stokes Company, 1911), 182–291.

13 A southwestward twist in the orientation of Iberia is common to all the early nautical charts (Vesconte, Dulcert), where it is, however, less pronounced, so Marseilles is on the same latitude as Bordeaux, and Venice lines up with the English Channel.

14 This is the first time the inlet of the Bristol Channel, into which the Severn River debouches, is shown on any chart before the early 14th-century Riccardiana chart (Bibl. Riccardiana, ms. 3827), although Britain had already been circumnavigated.

15 For ‘Paradise’ toponyms in the area in question, see the English Place Name Society volumes for Lincolnshire, Cambridgeshire and Norfolk. I owe this paragraph to Catherine Delano-Smith, who also points to two rare survivors of what would have been a relatively common written source of place-names for the eastern coast of England: the late 12th-century maritime itinerary ‘De viis maris’ discussed in Du Yorkshire à l’Inde: Une ‘géographie’ urbaine et maritime de la fin du XIIe siècle (Roger de Howden?), ed. Patrick Gautier Dalché (Geneva: Droz, 2005); and the mid 15th-century rutter (British Library (BL), Lansdowne MS. 285, fols. 136–40), transcribed in D. W. Waters, The Rutters of the Sea: The Sailing Directions of Pierre Garcie; A Study of the First English and French Printed Sailing Directions (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1967), 187–95.

16 A central tenet in the notion of a locus amoenus—which goes back to Classical times and was propagated in England by Gildas (De Excidio Britanniae et Conquestu [The Ruin of Britain], d. 570) and Bede (Historia Ecclesiastica [The Ecclesiastical History of the English People], d. 735)—rests on the symbolism of monastic space, which allowed monks ‘to inhabit the spiritual places of Paradise, Sion and the Heavenly Jerusalem’ (Catherine A. M. Clarke, Literary Landscapes and the Idea of England, 700–1400 (Cambridge: D.S. Brewer, 2006), 69). See also Rose Mitchell and David Crook, ‘Pinchebeck Fen map: A fifteenth-century map of Lincolnshire fenland,’ Imago Mundi 51 (1999): 40–50.

17 The epithet ‘the English Holy Land’ as applied to the Fenlands is cited by Sybil Marshall (a native of the region) in English Folk Tales (London: J. M. Dent, 1996), 160. The identities of the seven churches depicted on the Avignon chart are uncertain except possibly for Cologne, Bruges and Münster. The others may be assumed from the adjacent place-names.

18 On Pietro Vesconte’s atlases of 1313 (BnF, Cpl, GE DD-687 (RES)) and 1318 (Museo Correr, port. 28), place-names include, from south to north: brugis, collogna, ollanda, frislanda, danesmark. See also Pietro Vesconte’s world map from Marino Sanudo’s Liber secretorum fidelium crucis of 1321 (BAV Vat. Lat 2972, fol. 112v–113); and 1324–1325 (BL, Add. MS 27376, fol. 187v–188).

19 Elsewhere I have interpreted brye as the Norse form of Bruges (see James M. Murray, Bruges, Cradle of Capitalism 1280–1390 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005), 24. Placing Bruges north of Cologne is peculiar to the Avignon chart.

20 Skanör is found on the Pietro Vesconte/Paolino Veneto mappamundi, c. 1330 (BnF, ms Lat. 4939, fol. 9) and on both the Dulcert charts.

21 Courland was conquered by the Teutonic knights at the beginning of the 14th century (battle of Gdansk, 1308). The place-name Kurland (Courland) is found on the Ebstorf mappamundi (second half of the 13th century, destroyed in WWII) and on the Pietro Vesconte/Paolino Veneto mappamundi cited in note 20. And if we accept Gernelant as representing Courland, we may also see it in the place-name guendenal on two mappaemundi in Vatican City (Vat Lat 2972 and Pal Lat 1362A).

22 Godansk appears in red on the Dulcert chart of 1339 (BnF, GE B 696 (RES)).

23 A vignette on the Dulcert map of 1339 portrays the merchants and explains that, Ad civitatem istam venunt mercatores cum species, et postea vadunt per mare Gothilandie ad portes Flandres, specialiter in Bruges [To this city come merchants with spices, and then they go by the Gotland Sea to the ports of Flandres, especially to Bruges].