Mappamundi Research Paper

The notion of renaissance era being regulated by medieval era is also applied to the field of cartography. Renaissance Universalis Cosmographia, Ribeiro’s map, Mercator’s projection and map had remarkable resemblance to medieval mappamundi. Although mappamundi looked way too disparate in comparison to the other three, the ideas behind and the premises on which the 16th century maps were created were inherently swayed by the mappamundi. The key distinctions between these arose from the circumstances they were designed in, the purpose they would be used for, the availability of the resources, the development that they followed, the precise location of their generation and the cartographic skills of their makers. If all these variables were to
Firstly, “mappamundi relied on roman and early Christian authors” whereas “the Waldseemuller map reaches even further back to the Hellenistic world of Ptolemy, and his geometric perception of the terrestrial and celestial worlds” (Brotton, p 152). Secondly, mappamundi did not buy any of the prevailing arguments. However, Waldseemuller took incentive from the “theoretical, academics maps and projections of Ptolemy… and sailing charts and maps produced by contemporary pilots and navigators” (Brotton, p 152). Mappamundi, rather than a cartographic image, is a religious object that demonstrates a pathway to attain the spiritual truth and the journey of the ones who strived to achieve this goal. It is “defined by theology, not geography, where place is understood through faith rather than location, and the passage of time according to biblical events is more important than the depiction of territorial space” (Brotton, p89). The territorial space exhibited in the mappamundi is the combination of mere material entities that forms a route to the spiritual destination. It centre is occupied by Jerusalem – “the site so central to the Christian faith due to Christ’s crucification”