Nordpazifik / Rußland / Nordamerika Ortelius, Abraham, 1584, 47 x 35,1 cm North Pasfic / Russia / North America Copper Plate, Hand Colored This is a original version of a map depicting large parts of Asia. Other regions of the world shown in the Tartar world include Persia, China, Japan and parts of North America. China is portrayed as elongated and narrowly displayed. Japan is depicted to the south whose borders cross the Bering Sea almost to California. Interestingly the Korean Peninsula is absent. Present as an ornament are two decorative cartouches. The upper right and lower left with text in Latin. In 1596 the renown cartographer Abraham Ortelius produced his new revised edition of Claudius Ptolemy's "Geographia". In 1597 followed the Cologne edition of this work. Ptolemy (90-168 AD), was a Greek mathematician, geographer, astronomer, astrologer and philosopher, and probably worked in Alexandria. His most important work "Geography Outline", was better known as "Geographia". This is the princable classical period, atlas style publication of the ancient world. Ptolemy's work was based on parts of older sources."Geographia" contained 27 "Maps" (1x world, 10x Europe, 4x Africa and 12x Asia) and descriptions of about 8,000 places. It used an innovative system of coordinates and was one of the first attempts to present the earth as round. Like many ancient works, original copies of this atlas were lost and then rediscovered by the Western world in the 14th Century during the early Renaissance period. Representations of Ptolemys work were was used as the basis for many maps that were printed in numerous editions throughout Europe. It was not until the 16th Century that cartographers broke away from a geocentric "Ptolemaic world view" and started to draw on new found discoveries and methods to represent the world. References Tooley's Dictionary of Mapmakers, Early World Press, 2004
