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Greetings, I am new to this mailing list and I'd like to introduce myself and my web site. I am a GIS professional with an interest in historical maps, specifically maps of solar eclipses. I run a new web site, www.eclipse-maps.com, which features historical eclipse maps and new eclipse maps that I've prepared by integrating eclipse calculations with ArcGIS software. This web site was launched in January and is not yet complete, but there is substantial content on the History and Gallery pages -- over 1,000 historical eclipse maps from 1654 to the present and several hundred new eclipse maps that I published. If anyone has done research on or access to images of historical solar eclipse maps, I'd be very interested. Now I'd like to mention a cartographic mystery I just found today. Although I have an interest in historical maps, I'm not qualified as a map historian and would be grateful for any clues or advice. My jaw dropped when I just found this map, http://content.cdlib.org/ark:/13030/hb5779n99w/ It's a purported map of a solar eclipse over eastern Mexico with a date on the map of 1688. Can it possibly be? If so, it would pre-date the next earliest known eclipse map from the Americas by 143 years, the 1831 Bowen & Gray map (see http://www.eclipse-maps.com/Eclipse-Maps/History/Pages/1831-1850.html) and would also be the third earliest positively-known eclipse map. It seems astonishing that the third-ever solar eclipse map would be from the New World. But it's a mystery. Although the map text seems to clearly indicate an eclipse, in NASA's eclipse database, I can't find a solar eclipse in 1688 over Mexico. (I've also posted this query about the year of eclipse to the solar eclipse mailing list (SEML) and some eclipse specialist will probably find the right eclipse for me) The notation "De Asta Llego el Eclipse del Sol" seems to translate to "Up came the solar eclipse" along what seems to be a sunrise line of eclipse. The map correctly shows Baja California as a peninsula instead of as an island, unlike some other maps of this period. But I believe that it was just about this time when maps began to correctly depict the Sea of Cortez, so that's not a definite red-flag. I checked the founding dates of several places on the map and they seem to predate 1688, but I have not done an extensive study of these place names, nor whether the cartographic style of the map fits this era. This map is from the collection of the Bancroft Library of U.C. Berkeley, but the metadata notes don't contain any real information beyond what is visible on the map. Can a Spanish-speaker provide any further insight on the meaning of the map text? If anyone can deduce any further information about the year of publication, year of eclipse, cartographer, astronomer who performed the calculations, and provenance of this map, I'd be very curious to know. best regards, Michael Zeiler Santa Fe, New Mexico USA _______________________________________________ MapHist: E-mail discussion group on the history of cartography hosted by the Faculty of Geosciences, University of Utrecht. The statements and opinions expressed in this message are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of the University of Utrecht. The University of Utrecht does not take any responsibility for the views of the author. List Information: http://www.maphist.nl Maphist mailing list [email protected] http://mailman.geo.uu.nl/mailman/listinfo/maphist
