 and Matthias Ringmann began collaboration on their edition of Ptolemy in 1507 with Ringmann travelling to Italy to obtain a Greek manuscript of the ‘

’, now held in the Vatican Library (Vat. Grec. 191). With this key reference progress accelerated, but completion was forestalled in 1508 by the death of their patron, Duke René II of Lorraine. The new edition was not published until 1513 by Johannes Schott in Strasbourg. By then, Waldseemüller had pulled out of the project and was not credited for his cartographic work. Nevertheless, his maps were recognized as important contributions to the science of cartography and were considered a standard reference work for many decades.

Johannes Schott (1477–1550) was an important printer in Strasbourg. He was responsible for printing 

’s ‘Margarita Philosophica’ (1503–1508), Martin Luther’s ‘Invocavit Sermons’ (1523), Hans Weiditz and Otto Brunfels ‘Herbarium Vivae Icones’ (1520s–1530s), and other notable Humanist and Reformist works. The new Latin translation of the text by Mathias Ringmann (1482–1511) is based on Jacopo d’Angelo’s translation and was edited by Jacob Aeschler and George Uebelin. The atlas was reprinted in 1520 using the same woodcut blocks.


The twenty-seven maps of ancient geography, which constitute the first part of the work, are largely copied from the 1482 Ulm edition (see SC-TM-1482-Anon-PWorldMap). The world map maintains Ptolemaic projection and many of the traditional features, such as the ‘Mare Congelatum’ in the north, climatic divisions, and lines of longitude and latitude. However, it also reflects contemporary knowledge; importantly, it does not include the land bridge between southern Africa and Asia, which in traditional Ptolemaic maps landlocked the Indian Ocean; instead, the southern edge of the map is left open. This is not the first printed Ptolemaic map to show an open Indian Ocean. That accolade goes to Bernard Sylvanus’s 1511 issue of his ‘

’ (see SC-TM-1511-Sylvanus-PWorldMap). 



’s rejection of Claudius Ptolemy’s southern continent stemmed from his familiarity with the Portuguese voyages along the west coast of Africa and around the Cape of Good Hope. He also studied under 

 at the University of Freiburg whose ‘Margarita Philosophica’ (see SC-TM-1503-Reisch-PWorldMap), included an influential world map critical of Ptolemy. Although Reisch includes a land bridge between Africa and Asia, he makes a note on it in Latin, "hic non terra sed mare est: in quo mare magnitudinus Insulae sed Ptolemeo fuerent incognitae" ("here there is not land but sea, in which sea there is a mass of islands not known to Ptolemy").

 at the University of Freiburg and then moved to Basel in the late 1490s, where he met the printer Johannes Amerbach. In 1506, he moved to Saint-Dié in Lorraine, where Duke René II had established a humanist academy, the Gymnasium Vosagense. Waldseemüller was one of the earliest members, providing expertise in both cosmography and theology. It was at the Gymnasium that he met Matthias Ringmann and Jean Basin de Sendacour, with whom he would collaborate on his greatest geographical work. The trio had originally aimed to produce a new edition of Claudius Ptolemy’s ‘

’, inspired by the versions already published throughout Europe. However, this idea was abandoned after they read about Amerigo Vespucci’s voyage to the Americas. With Portuguese accounts of circumnavigating Africa, it became certain that the Indian Ocean was not landlocked; this dealt a serious blow to Ptolemaic geography. Instead, they decided to create a map that compared Vespucci’s geographical information with Ptolemy’s, along with an explanation of why they had deviated from Ptolemy’s precepts.

Waldseemüller’s 1513 edition of Ptolemy’s ‘

’ is one of the most important of all editions of Ptolemy. It contains the first printed instance of the name ‘America’ being applied to the discoveries across the Atlantic: ‘The fourth part of the earth, we have decided to call Amerige, the land of Amerigo we might even say, or America because it was discovered by Amerigo’. The supplement of twenty new maps, (‘tabulae modernae’) was included in the new ‘

’ as a separate appendix titled ‘Claudii Ptolemaei Supplementem’ and is considered to be the first modern atlas. Maps of Lorraine and the upper Rhine region were the first printed maps of those regions and were probably based on survey work done by Waldseemüller himself.

This windswept map on a Ptolemaic projection comes from 

'. Waldseemüller was a hugely influential and pioneering cartographer. His '

' was significant because it contained twenty ‘modern’ maps alongside the traditional Ptolemaic maps represented in all the earlier versions of the atlas. It also includes one of the earliest references to the new world as ‘America’ in honor of the Italian explorer Amerigo Vespucci.  

Geographically, this map is a unique combination of ancient cartography with contemporary knowledge, which includes information from explorations of the Americas and voyages around Africa. Surrounding the map is a finely rendered series of exquisitely rendered windheads with expressive, individualized features.

Although this map is based on Ptolemaic principles, interestingly, it does not include a land bridge between southern Africa and Asia, land- locking the Indian Ocean; instead, the southern edge of the map is left open.


Waldseemüller's Amended Ptolemaic World Map