This 1491 Map May Have Influenced Christopher Columbus
A 1491 map that likely influenced Christopher Columbus's conception of world geography is getting a new lease on life, now that researchers have revealed its faded, hidden details with cutting-edge technology.
Researchers pulled off this feat by turning to multispectral imaging, a powerful digital tool that can recover texts and images on damaged documents, said the project's leader, Chet Van Duzer, a board member of the multispectral imaging group known as The Lazarus Project at the University of Rochester in New York.
"Almost all of the writing on the map had faded to illegibility, making it an almost unstudyable object," Van Duzer told Live Science. But after the high-tech imaging uncovered the map's minutia, he was able to show that this 527-year-old map not only influenced Columbus but was also integral to Martin Waldseemüller's legendary 1507 map, which was the first to call the New World by the name "America." [See Images of the Newly Deciphered 1491 Map]
Long and winding road
The map — created by German cartographer Henricus Martellus in Florence — shows the world as Westerners knew it in 1491, right before Columbus set sail. In his 4-foot by 6.6-foot (1.2 by 2 meters) map, Africa (albeit, a greatly lopsided one) in on the left; above Africa is Europe, with Asia to the east; and Japan sits near the far-right corner.
Of course, the map doesn't show North and South America, which were still unknown to the Western world. (Although, arguably, the Vikings likely settled parts of Canada in about A.D. 1000.)
More: https://www.livescience.com/63339-map-influenced-christopher-columbus.html
The researchers used multispectral imaging to reveal the images and text on the map. Credit: Image by Lazarus Project / MegaVision / RIT / EMEL, courtesy of the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library
