TITLE:
America’s Birth Certificate: The Oldest Globular World Map: c. 1507
AUTHORS:
Stefaan Missinne
KEYWORDS:
America’s Birth Certificate, Cartographic Enigma, Waldseemüller, Leonardo da Vinci, Medical History, New York
JOURNAL NAME:
Advances in Historical Studies,
Vol.4 No.3,
July
2,
2015
ABSTRACT: In 2012, a woodcut print for a c. 11 centimeter globe was discovered in an ancient volume in the
University Library in Munich. This pivotal 1 million US$ globular world map, which only differs
marginally from four other extant woodcut copies, attracted worldwide media attention. This discovery
ignited the search for the date and the origin of an enigma in the form of an intricate secretive
small Renaissance map. The aforementioned had been acquired inserted in a French adapted
and unauthorised copy of the Introduction to Cosmography dated 1507 and printed in Lyon. The
son of a Dutch American immigrant from Flusching, H. C. Kalbfleisch bought it in Paris in 1881 and
brought it to New York. The author offers key evidence that this secretive map is an important
misinterpreted and misdated cultural historical prototype which antedates five later woodcut
copies: gores in Munich UB, Minnesota-Hauslab, Christie’s, SL Munich and Offenburg. He proves
that its size and scale are inspired by a calculation of Leonardo da Vinci as described in one of his
Codices, and applied on the 1504 Ostrich Egg globe discovered in London 2012. The research
methodology used is stemmatics as developed by the German scholar K. Lachmann applied on ancient
maps and the evaluation of the scientific aspects and architectural, historical and artistic design.
Evidence was offered that the Introduction to Cosmography printed in France in which the engraved
map was loosely inserted, together with two additional copper engravings, was printed prior
to March 1508. The map research leads to the Benedictine monk and German cartographer,
globe constructor and astrologist Donnus Nicolaus Germanus. The latter was the first who constructed
a terrestrial and a celestial globe for the library of the Pope Pius IV. The two additional
copper engravings lead to the Dutch born medical doctor and astrologer Guillelmus de Wissekerke,
supplier of astrological instruments for French kings and the Duke of Milan. The artistic
decorator for these copper engravings L. Boulengier was from the city of Albi in France, a possible
key stepping-stone to the Papacy in Rome. The cathedral in Albi stood as an architectural symbol
against the Cathars. Boulengier drew his inspiration from the Gothic flamboyant style of that
world heritage cathedral in his home town Albi. He decorated these engravings on behalf of the
powerful and art-loving Florimond de Robertet, Secretary of State for three subsequent French
kings including King Francis I, 1515. Robertet was a client of Leonardo da Vinci. A date on two of the three artistic prints is a key date for the royalty of France. The French king Louis XII lost the
succession of his House Valois-Orléans to the House of Valois-Angoulême after failing to produce a
male heir to the throne. The author concludes that the small globular map naming America is
America’s oldest Birth Certificate. A printed letter—early 1508—by Martin Waldseemüller provides
the date. The small map precedes by more than eight years the large woodcut world map
discovered in 1903 in Castle Wolfegg (Baden-Württemberg) by the Austrian Jesuit priest Dr. J.
Fischer and which was sold to the Library of Congress, in 2001 for US $10 million. This research is
a reappraisal. It is also a rebuttal of a misdirection in the history of science and a misleading error
of 133 years ago. It combines medical, geographical, and cultural history of science. It leads the
reader through Italian and French Renaissance and concentrates on aspects of architecture, map
design, Leonardo da Vinci, French Royalty, and the early discovery of America. It offers a surprising
ending leading to the city of New York, named Nouvelle-Angoulême in 1524.