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The Independent (London) newspaper for Saturday, 21 May 2011, has, on 'News' section pages 32-33, a colour-illustrated publicity spread on the London Map Fair this June. The article is titled either 'A world of maps at your fingertips' or (with the writer's portrait) 'Maps that changed the world'; both with the by-line of Jay Merrick. The large centre-piece is 'Fra Mauro's [world] map, circa 1450' whose caption opines, in part, that it "is considerably more beautiful than the much earlier Hereford Mappa Mundi". (Does this call for [anachronistic?] 'Pistols at dawn' between Venetians and English?). Even though the Fra Mauro image here is as if illicitly photographed through a glass pane from a distance, someone has editorially deemed it useful (or correct?) to print it with north at the top. [Pause, for some readers, for thought . . .] As some will know, or remember, the Fra Mauro manuscript was drawn with south at top; and, as such, this is how it ought to have been reproduced. If only to test the interpretative skills of the 'average' reader; or even to dramatically put across the message that not all western European maps were north-oriented. An opportunity lost to leisurely and graphically educate some readers (and potential converts to collecting). But we are treated to a far better image of the island of Rhodes (although we are not informed as to its identification) from a manuscript copy of 'The Kitab-i Bahriye, 1513', where the caption states: "A later edition included a map of the Americas, although the first depiction, in 1500, was by Juan de la Costa [sic], a conquistador who sailed with Columbus." Not illustrated is a version of "Braun and Hogenberg's bird's-eye-view map of London [that] must have seemed almost hallucinatory in 1547 . . ." Indeed, the printed map-view must have been somewhat hallucinatory as Braun was born only 6 years before and Hogenberg was then only 12 years old. The 1547 date may possibly be an oblique reference to the so-called (still) incomplete 'Copperplate Map of London' that may, according to some sources, date from around 1547-59. This attractively-produced and designed publicity article - perhaps unconsciously - unhappily exemplifies a typical feature of the 17th - 19th centuries' use of maps in volumes: the main narrative text (by Jay Merrick) and/or illustration captions don't always match the image (and vice versa). In this itself, however, it may still be considered 'educational':-) Francis Herbert (standing by for the flak)
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