Asiae Nova Descriptio
Abraham Ortelius’ Map of Asia: Charting the Discoveries of Marco Polo
Antwerp, 1595. Copperplate Engraving with original hand-color & Japanese manuscript in the margins. 18 3⁄4 " x 23 1⁄4 "
Ortelius' second plate of Asia, issued in his Theatrum Orbis Terrarum, the first modern world atlas, originally published in Antwerp in 1570. The map extends from the Red Sea and Turkey in the west to New Guinea in the east, and from the Central Asian steppe south to the northern coast of Java.
The interior of Asia is populated with the names of nomadic peoples, including the Bashkirs (Baschidorum horda) and the Merkit (Mecritorum horda). China is depicted with notable specificity: the former smuggling port of Lampo (Shuangyu), and the major trade cities of Ningbo, Quanzhou, and Guangzhou all appear. At the location of present-day Beijing stands Cambalu, a corruption of Khanbaliq, the Yuan Dynasty winter capital known to Marco Polo. Quinsai, Marco Polo's name for Hangzhou, appears in the northeast. A river connects the fictitious Cajamaj Lacus to Lac Salsus (Qinghai Lake).
The map preserves several significant cartographic errors characteristic of the period. Japan is substantially misprojected. The Philippines appear incomplete, with Luzon absent entirely. Sumatra is mapped alongside a Java Major and Java Minor, reflecting the conflation found in Marco Polo's Travels. In the Moluccas, Tidore and Ternate, the rival sultanates at the center of the clove trade, are identified. New Guinea, named by Yñigo Ortiz de Retez during the Villalobos Expedition, appears with partial detail along its northwestern coast.
Item #SJF00127
Price: $3,800