A lost map of Fra Mauro found in a sixteenth century copy

References

• Auction held on 24 October 1984 in the Salamon—Agustoni—Agrati Gallery, Milan. The portolan was knocked down for 40,000,000 Lire (about £16,000) plus 15% commission to an antiquarian bookshop in Milan that delivered it to a client probably French.
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• In 1537 Francesco Zeno was sent by Alessandro Pesaro, who in 1529 had been appointed Provveditore [Commander‐in‐chief] of the Venetian fleet, to the Crimea to ransom Janus Bey, the Ottoman Sultan Sulieman's Ambassador who had been taken prisoner by people living along the coast of the Crimea. By paying a huge sum of money, Francesco Zeno succeeded in liberating the Ambassador. See Cappellari, vol. IV.
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• Giorgio Sideri Calapoda was born in Crete and worked in Venice: of his work there has come down to us 4 navigational Charts and 5 hydrographical atlases dated from 1537 to 1565, four of which are dedicated to members of noble Venetian famílies.
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• Almagià bases this opinion on the fact that there is no reference either on the map of the world or on the Vatican map to the Fall of Constantinople to the Turks in June 1453, but it is questioned by other scholars. The map of the world bears the following ’leggenda’ in the middle of the Black Sea:
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• ‘Questa nobilissima Città di Costantinopoli anticamente si chiamano Bizanzio ma poi fu ingrandita da Costantino che vi trasferì l'impero Romano’ [This noble city of Constantinople in times past called Byzantium was enlarged by Constantine who made it the new capitai of the Roman Empire].
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• However, neither the Vatican map nor Callapoda's bears this ’leggenda ’although space was available on the Black Sea. Can we, therefore, infer from this that these two maps were made after the Fall of Constantinople to the Turks?
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• Not 36 as Almagià and others erroneously write.
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• Andrea Bianco, a Venetian and maker of naviga‐tional charts, not only worked in Fra Mauro's Workshop as can be seen from a document cited by Zurla (op cit. 85) but was also the captain of a galley as can be seen from the inscription on the chart he made of the Atlantic in 1448 ’Andrea Biancho Venician comito de galla mi fexe a londra MCCCC XXXXVIII’ [Andrea Bianco, a Venetian galley captain, made me in London in 1438]; and from documents in the State Archives in Venice that testify that from 1437 to 1451 he entered his name nine times for an examination to become captain's chief of staff and counsellor aboard gal‐leys bound for various destinations.
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• Fra Mauro was not sure whether Denmark was an island or a península: ’Isola d'Islandia o Dalia è parie in isola e in terra ferma e confina con alemagna bassa ‘ [The island of Islandia or Datia is in part an island and in part linked to the mainland bordering with Low Germany].
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• Zurla on page 28 states: ’isola di Islandia, cioè Sealandia dove è Copenhag’.
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• ‘Do nót wonder at seeing cities in Europe repre‐sented by such little drawings and those in Asia by such big ones: where I had space I made big drawings but where there was not sufficient space I had to draw small pietures and, reader, you must bear with me if your desires are not satisfied.’ See Zurla op. cit. 18.
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• Mittarelli, op. cit. paragraph 757.
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• Zurla, op. cit. 60.
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• 11. Ibid. 62.
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• 12. Ibid. 81.
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• Mittarelli, op. cit. paragraph 758.
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• Deceased
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