Terrestrial and celestial globes; their history and ... - 24grammata.com

Terrestrial and Celestial Globes.
and thither over the courses then followed by navigators.
Though South America has the entire coast line represented,
that section stretching southward from Peru is marked as
"terra incognita." Separated from the mainland by the
Strait of Magellan, marked by the legend, "initium freti
magellanici," is an extensive land area, that part lying to
the southwest of the strait being called "Regio Patalis,"
that to the southeast as "Terra Australis adhuc incomperta,"
while from this particular region there stretches away to the
east, as far as the meridian passing through the southern
point of Africa, a peninsula across which is the legend "Lusitani
ultra promotorium bone spei i Calicutium tendentes
hanc terra viderut, veru non accesserunt, quamobrem neq
nos certi quidq3 afferre potuimus," "The Portuguese sailing
beyond the Cape of Good Hope to Calicut, saw this land
but did not reach it, wherefore neither have we been able
to assert anything with certainty concerning it."
In the main Ptolemy served as a source of information
for the regions of the East, although much of the information
which the earlier years of the century had contributed
to a knowledge of that far-away country is recorded.
The large size of the globe gave opportunity for the
inscription of numerous geographical details, and of this
opportunity the engraver fully availed himself. It may well
be referred to as one of the most interesting of the early
globes, and its map records as possessing great scientific
value.
Tiraboschi alludes to a globe possessed by Cardinal Pietro
Bembo (1470-1547), citing a letter written by Giacomo
Faletti at Venice, June 3, 1561, to Alfonso II D'Este of Fer-
rara, in which mention is made of the same. "I have bought,"
says Faletti, "the globe of Cardinal Bembo for fifteen scudi
which is the price of the metal composing it, and I have given
it out to be decorated hoping to make of it the most beau-
tiful globe which is possessed by any Prince in the world. It
will cost altogether 25 scudi."''* This globe must have been
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