1535 Waldseemüller / Fries Map of China and Japan - First European Map of East Asia

A seminal work, this 1522 Lorenz Fries map is the first European map to focus on China and Japan and the first specific map to utilize Marco Polo's geographical reports of East Asia. It was also one of the first maps included in a printed edition of Ptolemy's Geographia to reflect a contemporaneous understanding of the subject region. It is also the only acquirable printed map of the region derived from Martin Waldseemüller's 1507 world map, representing one of the first efforts to reconcile ancient geography with new information from exploration and geographical theory.

The Framework

The map utilizes a Ptolemaic, trapezoidal projection and retains some of Ptolemy's assumptions. Most notably, the Sinus Magnus ('Great Bay') beyond the Malay Peninsula and the coast of Vietnam and a vast land mass reaching south, beyond, and below that bay. The map then incorporates new information derived from the 1507 Waldseemüller map.

The New Data

The map has an abundance of place names unknown to Ptolemy. Northern China (Provincia Cathai) is named; south of that, Marco Polo's Provincia Mangi appears. Far to the north, the 'Balor' are identified with an accompanying photograph of a bearded hunter - these were nomadic people who, according to Marco Polo, ate 'only deer.' Off the coast to the right of Cathai is an impressive illustration of the Great Khan, King of the Tartars, sitting in a tent surrounded by his army's tents. It was the Great Khan who received Marco Polo, his father, and his uncle during their epic journey. Tibet, here spelled 'Tebet', is prominent, and this is the earliest acquirable map to use for that placename. The Champa civilization, which once prospered in modern-day Vietnam, is here identified as Cianba Provincia Magna, with the king of Champa illustrated on his throne. (Fries' retention of the so-called 'Dragon's Tail' (see below) confuses matters: 'Cianba' should be further west.) Likewise, Bocat (Cambodia: Cambocati) appears here on the eastern rather than the western shore of the Sinus Magnus. Were it not for the efforts to preserve Ptolemy's geography, these places would have likely been much more accurately positioned. As it is, the retention of the Sinus Magnus led Waldseemüller and Fries to place these kingdoms too far to the east.

Japan

In the Pacific to the east of China, a large island is shown and identified as Zinpangri (Japan). This is the first regional map to show Japan in relation to the coast and to show it based on the data appearing on the 1507 Waldseemuller. Two cities are shown there: Sinpaugen and Cobebe. The only earlier separate map of Japan, appearing in the 1528 Bordone, does not place the island in relation to the coast and does not include any placenames beyond 'Ciampagu.'

The Indian Ocean, the Sinus Magnus, and Ptolemy's Appendix

Waldseemüller's geography in many areas radically moved beyond Ptolemaic assumptions, but in other areas made more gradual shifts. One of the notable features of early world maps based on Ptolemy is that the Indian Ocean believed to be an inland sea, with the southern part of Africa continuing eastward to meet China beyond the Malay Peninsula. The body of water between the Malay Peninsula and this encircling landmass, Ptolemy termed Sinus Magnus (Great Bay). By the time Waldseemüller was producing his map, Europeans understood that such a 'land bridge' between Africa and China did not exist (Portuguese navigation had proven this point), but there was as yet no exploratory evidence to indicate what precisely was beyond the legendary Sinus Magnus. The solution offered by Henry Martellus in 1490 (which Waldseemüller adopted) was to truncate the 'land bridge' at a point some distance south of India-beyond-the-Ganges. What remained of the land mass once thought to enclose the Indian Ocean was a massive, inward-curving peninsula - sometimes referred to as the Dragon's Tail. This feature graces many late 15th and early 16th-century world maps, including Waldseemüller's 1507 and 1513 maps. Fries, whose work was essentially a new edition of Waldseemüller, incorporates the same feature on both of his 'modern' world maps and includes the northernmost portions of it on his map of China and Japan.

Publication History and Census

This map was first issued in the 1522 Lorenz Fries Strasbourg edition of Ptolemy's Geographia. A further edition was produced in that same city in 1525. After that, two further editions of 1535 and 1541 were published in Lyons and Vienne-in-the-Dauphane, respectively. The editor of the 1535 edition, Michael Villanovus (Servetus), was tried for heresy in 1553 and burned at the stake. Reportedly, Calvin ordered copies of the Servetus edition of the book burned. Consequently, maps from the 1535 edition (of which this is a representative) are scarce. Overall, the four editions of Fries' Ptolemy are well represented in institutional collections.