Waldseemüller, Martin (ca. 1470-ca. 1522)

In 1507, on two maps of the world developed to accompany his Cosmographiae Introduction, Martin Waldseemüller included the name “America.” These maps were the first to use the name “America” for the southern part of the newly discovered Western Hemisphere, located in the middle of a land mass that would metamorphose during the 16th century into what we recognize today as South America.

The complete title of the first map, “Universalis cosmographia secundum Ptholomaei traditionem et Americi Vespucii alioru[m]que lustrations,” recognizes the work of the ancient Greek cartographer Claudius Ptolemy, as well as the reports of “discoveries” from 1497 to 1504 by the Italian navigator Amerigo Vespucci. It is not clear how much of the South American continent Vespucci actually visited, but his name was clearly placed in the center of the land area. Most significant in this recognition of Vespucci's discoveries is the fact that he concluded that the land was not a part of Asia. Unlike Columbus, who was certain that he had reached Asia, Vespucci was convinced that this land was something else. Vespucci transmitted this view in a series of letters, and Waldseemüller mapped this perspective on the new maps. Within the context of the Cosmographiae Introductio, this was a dramatic shift in the European worldview.

Waldseemüller's partner in this work was Matthias Ringmann, who edited and amended the text of Claudius Ptolemy's Geographia (the core of the Cosmographiae Introductio), a compilation of what was known about the geography of the world in about AD 150. Using the versions of Geographia published in Rome in 1478 and Ulm in 1482, as well as a Greek manuscript, Ringmann and Waldseemüller followed the modified text and original Ptolemaic maps with 20 new maps describing areas of the world not known 13 centuries earlier.

The first map was a modification of one of Ptolemy's conic projections, extending the coverage of the Eastern Hemisphere to include all of Earth's surface, except for the area in the Southern Hemisphere from 40° S latitude to the pole; however, the southern tip of Africa is carefully defined. As the knowledge base grew, maps created throughout the 16th century changed, with additions and modifications intended to make each one the most accurate and up-to-date representation. As new data emerged from the exploratory ventures to the New World (as well as eastward from the southern tip of Africa across the Indian Ocean), the maps of the world changed drastically (e.g., Mercator's maps of 1538 and 1569).

The title of the map, “World Description According to Ptolemy and the Travels of Americus [Page 3042][Page 3043]Vespucius and Others,” makes clear the cartographer's intention: to create a new world map from the most up-to-date resources (see Figure 1). Waldseemüller's second world map, composed of 12 globe gores, also includes “America.”

Figure 1 The world according to Ptolemy and the travels of Americus Vespucius and others

Source: Original map in the collection of the Library of Congress, Geography and Maps Division. Hand-colored version reprinted with permission of the author from Whitfield, P. (1994). The image of the world: 20 centuries of world maps (pp. 48–49). San Francisco: Pomegranate Artbooks.

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