The Discoveries of America to the Year 1525Weise, Arthur James
History
The Discoveries of America to the Year 1525
Weise, Arthur James
America -- Discovery and exploration
[466] The copy of Mercator’s map preserved in the National library, in
Paris, which is entitled “_Nova et aucta orbis terrae descriptio at usum
navigantium emendeté accommodata_,” measures seventy-eight and a half
inches by fifty inches. On this map is represented the earth _in plano_,
the meridians being paralleled and the parallels of latitude straight
lines, according to those principles of projection known as Mercator’s
projection. Respecting the latter, he says, in an inscription on the
chart: “On account of which considerations, we have increased gradually
the length of the degrees of latitude toward each pole proportionate
to the increase of the parallels beyond the length which they have on
the globe, relatively to the equator:—“_Quibus consideratis, gradus
latitudinum versus utrumque polum paulatim auximus pro incremento
parallelorum supra rationem quam habint ad acquinoctialem._” Abraham
Ortelius, the eminent cartographer, speaks of this map of Mercator’s as
“his never-enough-praised universal chart,—_Sua nunquam satis laudata
universalis tabula._”
[467] A copy of this chart in the general library of the State of New
York, at Albany, is entitled: “The Original Carte Figurative, of which
the above is an accurate fac-simile, was found on the 26th of June, 1841,
in the Locket-kas, of the States General, in the Royal archives at the
Hague.”
[468] “This map,” says John Romeyn Brodhead, the historian, “is
undoubtedly one of the most interesting memorials we have. It is about
three feet long, and shows, very minutely, the course of the Hudson River
from Manhattan to above Albany, as well as a portion of the sea-coast;
and contains, likewise, curious notes and memoranda about the neighboring
Indians,—the work, perhaps, of one of the companions of Hudson ... and
made within five years of the discovery of our river, its fidelity of
delineation is scarcely less remarkable than its high antiquity.”—Address
of J. Romeyn Brodhead, November 20, 1844. Coll. New York Historical Soc.
1845. p. 16.
[469] “_Ma so vele men heeft connen verstaen uyt i seggen ende beduyen
van de Maquaas so comen de Françoysen met sloupen tot bovem aen haer land
met haerluy handelen._”
[470] “_Fort van Nassoureen is binnen de wallen 58 voeten wydt in ’t
viercant de gracht is wydt 18 voeten._” Fort Nassau is 58 feet wide
between the walls and built as a square; the moat is 18 feet wide. “_’t
hujs is 36 voeten lanch en 26 wyt in t fort._” The house in the fort is
36 feet long and 26 wide.
[471] Journal of a voyage to New York and a tour in several of the
American colonies in 1679 and 1680, by Jasper Dankers and Peter Sluyter
of Wiewerd in Friesland. Translated from the original MSS. in the Dutch
for the Long Island Historical Society by Henry C. Murphy. Memoirs of
Long Island Hist. Soc. 1867. vol. i. p. 318.
INDEX.
Abaco, Great and Little, 107, 184.
Abaiòa, town, 224.
Aborigines, 1, 18, 19. (_See_ _Indians_.)
Abraham, 5.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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