Sylvanus’s atlas was never reissued making maps from this sole edition extremely rare.

Sylvanus’ map uses colour to distinguish between major regional names (printed in red), and place and named physical features such as rivers and mountains in black, using inset type. It has been suggested that this dual-colour printing style is done to mimic contemporary portolan charts, which used black and red to distinguish toponyms of various importance. The text in the atlas states that it used the maps of navigators to update Ptolemy’s original work, and the influence may also have extended to the aesthetic.

This world map is the first to use a cordiform (heart-shaped) projection to simulate the curvature of the globe, a technique that would be frequently emulated by subsequent mapmakers. It is also one of the first to show Japan as an island, the western coast of South America, labelled as 'Terre Sanctae Crucis,' a very northerly Cuba and Hispaniola, and a very westerly 'Terra Laboratorus' and 'Regalis Domus', preceded only by Johannes Ruysch’s 1507 world map.

The Sunderland Collection

The woodcut world map created by Bernardus Sylvanus in his 1511 Venice edition of Claudius Ptolemy's 'Geographia' is the first to use a cordiform (heart-shaped) projection to simulate the curvature of the Earth, a depiction that would be influential and frequently emulated by subsequent mapmakers. It is also among the earliest example of two-colour printing in cartography and include the first cordiform world map of its kind. Place names are printed in red and black, a significant technical advancement in rendering details. Sylvanus states that his maps update Ptolemy’s geography directly with more recent 'discoveries'.

Listed along the right side of the map are the five climatic zones of ancient Greek geographer Strabo (c.64-c.24 BCE) to categorise the Earth's habitability: two frigid, two temperate, and one torrid zone. To the right, the illustrated zodiac signs of Cancer (representing the Tropic of Cancer), Libra (the equator), and Capricorn (the Tropic of Capricorn) are featured, and surrounding the map are twelve charmingly windheads emerging from the clouds, representing the cardinal winds.

This map was included in Sylvanus’s 1511 Venice edition of Ptolemy's 'Geographia', which was groundbreaking in several regards. It was the only edition to add modern updates directly to Ptolemy’s maps, the only edition at the time to print maps on both sides of the page, the first edition printed in two colours, and the first Italian edition to use woodblocks.

This map may be a modification of a Portuguese prototype, adapted to Sylvanus' perspective and discretion, as the map was published in Venice - the adopted city of John Cabot - who had 'discovered' land in the same region as Portuguese explorers Gaspar and João Vaz Corte-Reals for the King of England. Collectively, dual-colour printing, decorative windheads, climatic zones, zodiac signs, and a striking heart-shaped projection, make this map especially distinctive from its contemporaries.

This map was included in Sylvanus’s 1511 Venice edition of the 'Geographia', which was ground-breaking in several regards: it was the first use of a cordiform (heart-shaped) projection in a world map to simulate the curvature of the Earth; and the first atlas to be printed in two colours. In addition to this, this map in particular is only the second printed map in a European Ptolemaic atlas to show America; and the first to depict Japan as an island.

Sylvanus's Heart-Shaped World Map