What Columbus thought the world looked like
George E. Nunn’s study, first published in 1924 and reissued in 1992, examines four historical questions about Columbus’s geographical beliefs, Atlantic voyages and early maps.
The story
George E. Nunn took four questions about Christopher Columbus and worked through each one: how long Columbus believed a degree of the Earth’s circumference to be, which decides how large he thought the globe was; what he knew of the Atlantic’s winds and currents; what he understood Asia to be; and how Florida came to be drawn on the Cantino map.
The American Geographical Society first published the study in 1924, as number 14 of its Research Series, and it was reprinted in 1972 and 1977. This expanded edition of 1992 comes from the Society’s collection at the Golda Meir Library of the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and adds a new essay by Clinton R. Edwards, The Test of Time, which asks how well Nunn’s arguments have held up. Historical maps and figures run through the text, two large maps fold out, and there are references and an index.
This copy is in grey cloth with black title panels lettered in gilt, and the pages look clean. Both folding maps have been photographed open, with their original creases; the collation and the state of the folds have not been checked in hand. There is no dust jacket.
Details
- Date
- 1992
- Publisher
- American Geographical Society Collection of the Golda Meir Library, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, in cooperation with the American Geographical Society, New York
- Edition
- Expanded edition, 1992
- Binding
- cloth: Gray cloth with gilt-lettered black front and spine labels
- Condition
- Very good appearance in supplied photographs. Gray cloth and black gilt title panels intact; pages clean-looking. Two large folding maps pictured open with original fold creases. Pencil '32-' on front free endpaper. No dust jacket shown. Collation and map fold integrity not verified in hand.
- Mark
- 32-