Athena Review Image Archive ™
Early Map of the Caribbean by Peter Martyr (1511)
Peter Martyr's map of the Caribbean (De Orbe Novo 1511).
Published between 1511 and 1530, Peter Martyr's book De Orbe Novo includes some of the the earliest descriptions of Spanish voyages to Mexico, Central and South America, and the Antilles.
This
map, from Martyr's 1511 edition, includes relatively accurate detail on
the coastlines from the Bay Islands of Honduras at Guanaca (Bonacca)
around to the mouth of the Orinoco. Martyr's sources for the mainland
coast were the 3rd and 4th voyages of Columbus and the voyages of
Ojeda. It also shows Bermuda for the first time on any map. Florida,
here called Isla de Beimenhi, was not to be visited by Ponce de
Leon for two more years, in 1513.
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