Matteo Ricci’s World Map

Along with about 3,500 other people I used to work at the Library Of Congress, so whenever I hear news about the Library, my ears prick up.

Earlier this week the Library’s website (at http://www.loc.gov/index.html)announced their exhibit of a world map drawn in 1602 by Matteo Ricci a missionary to China. The James Ford Bell Trust paid one million dollars for the map. It is second most expensive map ever sold.

The Library also displays the most expensive, the ten-million dollar Waldseemüller Map of 1507, the first document to name America.

The Ricci Map is destined to become part of the James Ford Bell Library at the University of Minnesota.

Ricci, a Jesuit priest, drew the huge map— it measures 5.5 feet tall by 12.5 feet wide—at the command of Emperor Wanli. Understandably, it places China at the center of the world.

Printed on rice paper, the map was designed to be mounted in six sections on a folding screen.

The map includes drawings of the western hemisphere and Ricci’s notes about North America describe 'humped oxen' (bison), wild horses and a region named 'Ka-na-ta' (Canada).

Ricci also included a brief description of the discovery of the Americas:

“In olden days,” he wrote in his Chinese script , “Nobody had ever known that there were such places as North and South America or Magellanica (An old name for Australia and Antarctica) But a hundred years ago, Europeans came sailing in their ships to parts of the sea coast, and so discovered them”.

I found it particularly interesting that this 400-year-old map shows details of my home state; Ricci labeled Florida as “the Land of Flowers”. This ancient map shows recognizable details of the Florida landscape, including Apalachicola Bay, and the St. John’s River (although Ricci thought the headwaters lay to the north instead of to the south). He also identified the barrier islands along Florida’s east coast.

His map fascinates me.

There are about four other copies in existence.

Next time one comes up for sale and I have an extra million dollars in my pocket, I think I’ll buy one.