Behold the largest surviving medieval map (158x133 cm), which has been kept for centuries at Hereford Cathedral in England. It has the common form for
mappa mundi, with East at the top and Jerusalem in the center. Around the edge are some scenes of heaven and hell.
Jerusalem.
The British Isles.
Italy, Sicily, and Crete with an enormous labyrinth.
Scandinavia, with a giant named Gansir and a bear.
Babylon.
Samarkand.
Constantinople and the Golden Fleece. In the imaginations of these western Christians, Constantinople was not such a great place, shown smaller than Paris or Rome.
Paradise, surrounded by a wall of fire, with angels looking on.
Beasts in the exotic east.
Wikipedia has a large image if you feel like exploring on your own. Some people who think the author of
The Travels of Sir John Mandeville (a fantasy travelog written around 1360) used this map have put a
cleaned-up version online, with all the places mentioned in the travels highlighted.
I love these maps because they show that some medieval people were not, in their minds, confined to the local or the recent. Their thoughts roved across the world, imagining golden kings in Africa and strange beast men in far Asia; they told stories of King Midas, the Argonauts, Troy, and Alexander the Great. Their world was large and growing larger.
No comments:
Post a Comment