Abraham Ortelius, Maris Pacifici…, 1603

The First Map of the Pacific Ocean

Ortelius was a great compiler of newly discovered geographical facts and information. His New World maps, as seen here in “Maris Pacifici…” reflect the geographer’s unique access to Mercator’s World map of 1569. The addition of Spanish and Portuguese sources in turn made his published maps of the New World the most influential maps of the late 16th and early 17th Centuries. The present map, which is featured in the first modern atlas, Theatrum Orbis Terrarum, is the first stand-alone map ever printed that is devoted to the Pacific Ocean.

In this map, North America is divided between Quivira in the west, New Spain to the south and Florida to the east. New place names appear along North America’s west coast. California is correctly shown as part of the largely unexplored mainland in the extreme west. Though North America is drawn incorrectly, coastlines and rivers are highly detailed. As well, many place names are shown along the coastlines of Mesoamerica and Peru, revealing the extent of Spanish colonization of the time.

The map is from the 1603 Latin edition, engraved by Frans Hogenberg. A labor-intensive stippling technique produced the tiny dots that illuminate the water’s surface of the great Pacific. Prominently depicted sailing west on the Circulus Capricorni is Magellan’s ship the Victoria, the first ship to successfully circumnavigate the world. At this time, not much was known about the vastness of the Pacific. Still with little information about the area, Ortelius relied on the information supplied by European strongholds in the Asia Pacific, as seen in the attention to detail in Japan and the Philippines. Ortelius’ “Maris Pacifici” is a testament to the art of cartography remaining as accurate as possible. Whereas many contemporary cartographers would show Nova Guinea (New Guinea) attached to Terra Australis, Ortelius depicted Nova Guinea as an island and alluded in an inscription that there was an unidentifiable southern continent yet to be discovered.

Flemish by birth, Abraham Ortelius became geographer to the king of Spain in 1575, whereby his access to Spanish maps gave him the means to create a more complete image of the New World than had previously been disseminated. A brilliant thinker, Ortelius offered the very first theory of continental drift, published in Thesaurus geographicus (1596). Gerardus Mercator and Ortelius were contemporaries and associates, close enough that history records that it was through Mercator’s encouragement that Ortelius pursued the creation of his important atlas, first issued in 1570.

This map is a keystone addition to any collection of the Americas as an example of one of the earliest and most influential models that included the mapping of the Pacific Ocean. A beautiful and important map from the Golden Age of Dutch and Flemish cartography, it contains splendid characteristics of remarkably fine engraving and showcases decorative details.

Refs.: Nordenskiold, p. 124; van den Broecke, Ortelius Atlas Maps, 12; Wheat, Mapping the Transmississippi West, vol. I, no. 15, p. 25.  Rumsey, List no.10001.067 (1589 ed.); Koeman Ort 38; Suárez, Shedding the Veil, p.111-112