Insets
The terrestrial globe features a number of insets. They mainly indicate the author and the place and date of the plates’ design, but one bears a dedication to Mercator’s benefactor Nicholas Perrenot lord of Granvelle […]
Category Archives: Description of the terrestrial globe
Bestiary
When a territory was uncharted, cartography gave pride of place to the imagination. Allegorical beasts of all kinds were depicted, including hybrid monsters and exotic creatures […]
Quinta
Mercator tried to prove that this fifth landmass existed and was huge, as if it were necessary to counterbalance the weight of the other continents […]
America
In Mercator’s day, America was a largely unexplored continent whose coastlines were still only vague. Despite the dearth of information, it is represented as completely as possible […]
Asia
In Asia, Mercator tried to make the most recent discoveries fit with the representation inherited from the ancient geographers […]
Africa
To draw Africa, Mercator no doubt referred to Martin Waldseemüller’s Carta marina navigatoria […]
Europe
Mercator decisively corrected the outline of the Mediterranean basin by reducing the longitudinal overextension inherited from Ptolemy […]
Measuring the world
On his terrestrial globe Mercator divided the known world into five parts: Europe, Africa, Asia, America and Quinta, a newly discovered southern continent […]
Influences and sources
Mercator was influenced by Ptolemy and Marco Polo but he did not bow to them. He knew how to use their writings while also rectifying and surpassing them […]