DEKAT DIGITAL 2019 - 2020

THE UPSIDE DOWN MAP
OF AFRICA
Nicolosi map of Africa by Giovanni Battista Nicolosi
This first edition of the ‘upside-down’ wall map of Africa was published in 1660 in Rome. It is in fine
condition and presented on four pages that have not been joined. The map is rare: the Antique Map
Price Record reports that only two of these first edition maps have been sold in the past 30 years.
The mapmaker was Giovanni Battista Nicolosi, a priest from Sicily who was a cartographer for
Pope Gregory XV’s Sacred Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith, established by the pope
to promote missionary work. This map is one of a set of four continents and a world map that he
produced for the second volume of Dell’Hercole e studio geografico di Gio Battista Nicolosi. A
second, slightly amended edition of the map was published posthumously.
Records show this is the first edition of the map because there are only four coastal place names off the south-east
coast south of 30°S – more were added in the second edition. The map is based on a 1650 map by the famous French
cartographer, Nicolas Sanson, but follows Giovanni Ramusio, who wrote a seminal book on navigation and in 1554
included an ‘upside down’ map of the continent. South on top seems to have been an influence of Arab mapmakers
in North Africa, who provided geographical information to the Italians.
Reference: Betz, Mapping of Africa #94.
For further information contact Roger Stewart at RogerStewartOnline@gmail.com
106