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Add MS 15760
- Record Id:
- 032-002093447
- Hierarchy Root Ancestor Record Id:
- 032-002093447
- MDARK:
- ark:/81055/vdc_100000000044.0x0001f1
- LARK:
- ark:/81055/vdc_100165144056.0x000001
- SLARK:
- Format:
- ISAD(G)
- Reference (shelfmark):
- Add MS 15760
- Title:
- Henricus Martellus Germanus, Insularium illustratum
- Scope & Content:
-
This volume is one of only five surviving manuscripts of the Insularium illustratum (Illustrated Book of Islands), a descriptive atlas of island maps, made by Henricus Martellus Germanus (also known as Heinrich Hammer), a German miniaturist and cartographer who was active in Florence between 1480 and 1496.
Other extant copies of the Insularium are now Leiden, Cod. Vossianus Lat. Ill; Chantilly, Library of the Musee Conde, MS 483; Minneapolis, University of Minnesota, Bell Library, B1475; and Florence, Biblioteca Laurenziana, XXIX.25.
Contents:
ff. 1r–75r: Henricus Martellus Germanus, Insularium illustratum.
ff. 55v-56r, 57v, 62v, 69v-70r, 71v-72r, 73v-74r, and 75v are blank.
Decoration:
A historiated initial 'O' in colours and gold, depicting a fleet of ships on the sea (f. 1r). Small initials in colours and gold throughout. 97 large and small framed miniatures in colours and gold, with accompanying scrolls, depicting islands, towns, and cities (ff. 3r, 3v, 4v, 5r, 6r, 7r, 8r, 8v, 9r, 9v, 11r, 11v, 12v, 13r, 13v, 14r, 14v, 15r, 15v, 16r, 16v, 17r (x2), 17v, 18r, 18v, 19r, 19v, 20r, 20v, 21r, 21v, 22r, 22v, 23v (x2), 24r, 25r, 25v (x2), 26r, 26v, 27r (x2), 27v, 28v, 29r, 29v, 30r, 30v, 31r, 31v (x2), 32r, 32v, 33r, 33v, 34r, 35r, 35v, 36v, 37r, 38r, 38v, 39r (x2), 40r, 40v, 41r (x2), 41v, 42r, 42v (x2), 43r (x2), 43v, 44r, 44v, 45r, 45v, 47v-48r, 49v-50r, 51v, 52v, 53v, 54r, 54v-55r, 56v-57r, 58v-59r, 62r, 63v-64r, 68v-69r, 70v-71r, 72v-73r, 74v-75r).
The subjects of the miniatures are as follows:
f. 3r: Corfu.
f. 3v: Pachisos.
f. 4v: Sant Maura (now Lefkada).
f. 5r: Ithaca.
f. 6r: Cephalonia.
f. 7r: Iacinthus (now Zante).
f. 8r: Strofades.
f. 8v: Sapientia, Capra and Sanveneto.
f. 9r: Citharea (now Cyprus).
f. 9v: Sichilus (now Antikythera).
f. 11r: Crete.
f. 11v: Carpathos.
f. 12v: Rhodes.
f. 13r: The city of Rhodes.
f. 13v: Symi.
f. 14r: Caristus (now Calchis).
f. 14v: Diluphanos (now Piscopia).
f. 15r: Caria (now Nixari).
f. 15v: Stimphalia.
f. 16r: Cherasia (now Santorini).
f. 16v: Sicandros (now Sikinos).
f. 17r: Policandros (now Folegrandos) (above); Polimia (below).
f. 17v: Milos.
f. 18r: Siphari.
f. 18v: Serpinus.
f. 19r: Thermia.
f. 19v: Kea.
f. 20r: Andros.
f. 20v: Caloieros Scopolus.
f. 21r: Tino.
f. 21v: Michole.
f. 22r: Delos.
f. 22v: Souda.
f. 23v: Paros (above); Antiparos (below).
f. 24r: Panalia.
f. 25r: Naxos.
f. 25v: Podia Prima and Podia Secunda (above); Raclea and Chero (below).
f. 26r: Nio.
f. 26v: Anaphios.
f. 27r: Amurgo or Amurgopolis (above); Chinera and Levata (below).
f. 27v: Scopolus Caloriorum.
f. 28v: Lango (now Kos).
f. 29r: Kalamos.
f. 29v: Heros.
f. 30r: Patmos.
f. 30v: Dipsi.
f. 31r: Crusie.
f. 31v: Nicarea (above); Mandria (below).
f. 32r: Agatusa.
f. 32v: Samo.
f. 33r: The Furni Islands.
f. 33v: Tenosa.
f. 34r: Psara.
f. 35r: Chios.
f. 35v: The town of Chios.
f. 36v: Lesbos.
f. 37r: Tenedos.
f. 38r: Gallipoli.
f. 38v: Marmara.
f. 39r: Calonimon.
f. 40r: Byzantium (now Istanbul).
f. 40v: Lemnos.
f. 41r: Embarus (above); Mandrachi (below).
f. 41v: Taxo.
f. 42r: Mount Athos.
f. 42v: Santratos (above); Limen (below).
f. 43r: Dromos (above); Macri (below).
f. 43v: Skopelos and Skiathos.
f. 44r: Skopelos.
f. 44v: Skyros.
f. 45r: Euboea.
f. 45v: Aegina.
ff. 47v-48r: Cyprus.
ff. 49v-50r: Sicily.
f. 51v: Corsica.
f. 52v: Sardinia.
f. 53v: Britain.
f. 54r: Ireland.
ff. 54v-55r: Scandinavia.
ff. 56v-57r: Crete.
ff. 58v-59r: The Holy Land.
f. 62r: Taprobana (now Sri Lanka).
ff. 63v-64r: Italy.
ff. 68v-69r: Map of the world.
ff. 70v-71r: The western coast of Europe, north-western coast of Africa, and the Mediterranean Sea, west of France.
ff. 72v-73r: The Mediterranean Sea, east of Spain.
ff. 74v-75r: The Black Sea.
- Collection Area:
- Western Manuscripts
- Project / Collection:
- Additional Manuscripts
- Hierarchy Tree:
- [{ "id" : "032-002093447", "parent" : "#", "text" : "Add MS 15760: Henricus Martellus Germanus, Insularium illustratum" , "li_attr" : {"class": "orderable"} }]
- Hierarchy Record Ids:
- 032-002093447
- Is part of:
- not applicable
- Hierarchy:
- 032-002093447
- Container:
- not applicable
- Record Type (Level):
- Fonds
- Extent:
-
1 volume
- Digitised Content:
- http://access.bl.uk/item/viewer/ark:/81055/vdc_100165144056.0x000001 (digital images currently unavailable)
- Thumbnail:
-
- Languages:
- Latin
- Scripts:
- Latin
- Start Date:
- 1485
- End Date:
- 1495
- Date Range:
- c 1490
- Era:
- CE
- Access:
-
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- User Conditions:
- Letter of introduction required to view this manuscript
- Physical Characteristics:
-
Material: Parchment.
Dimensions: 340 × 240 mm (written area: 205 × 120 mm).
Foliation: ff. 75 (+ 1 unfoliated parchment flyleaf at the beginning and end).
Script: Humanistic.
Binding: Pre-1600. Dark brown leather over wooden boards, blind tooling, with marks from lost bosses and two clasps. Spine recovered, British Museum in-house.
- Custodial History:
-
Origin:
Florence, Italy.
Provenance:
Augustus Frederick (b. 1773, d. 1843), duke of Sussex: his armorial bookplate pasted on the inside upper cover; purchased by Thomas Thorpe (b. 1791, d. 1851), bookseller, at one of his sales, for 60 guineas (see Davies, 'Behaim, Martellus and Columbus' (1977), p. 457).
Purchased by the British Museum for £100 through Thomas Thorpe, 25 April 1846.
- Publications:
-
Catalogue of the Manuscript Maps, Charts, and Plans, and of the Topographical Drawings in the British Museum, 3 vols (London: British Museum, 1844-1861, repr. Brussels: Gregg Associates, 1962), III (1861), pp. 32-34.
Catalogue of Additions to the Manuscripts in the British Museum in the Years 1846-1847 (London: British Museum, 1882), p. 26.
F. W. Hasluck, 'Notes on MSS. in the British Museum relating to Levant Geography and Travel', Annual of the British School at Athens, 12 (1905-6), 196-215 (p. 199).
Roberto Almagià, 'I mappomondi di Enrico Martello e alcuni concetti geografici di Cristoforo Colombo,' Bibliofilia, 42 (1940), 288–311.
Paul Gallez, 'Les Grands Fleuves d’Amérique Du Sud Sur Le Ptolémée Londonien d’Henri Hammer (1489) (Die Großen Südamerikanischen Flüsse Auf Der Londoner Ptolemäus-Karte von Heinrich Hammer (1489)', Erdkunde, 29: 4 (1975), 241–47 (p. 244).
Ilaria Luzzana Caraci, 'L’opera cartografica di Enrico Martello e la ‘prescoperto’ dell’ America,' Rivista Geografica Italiana, 83 (1976), 335-44 (p. 336).
Arthur Davies, 'Behaim, Martellus and Columbus,' The Geographical Journal, 143: 3 (1977), 451–59.
Albinia de la Mare, 'New Research on Humanistic Scribes in Florence', in Miniatura fiorentina del Rinascimento, 1440-1525: un primo censimento, ed. by Annarosa Garzelli, 2 vols, ([Florence]: Giunta regionale toscana, 1985), I, pp. 395-574 (pp. 517, 542).
Rushika February Hage, 'The Island Book of Henricus Martellus,' Portolan, 56 (2003), 7–23.
Treasures of the British Library, ed. by Nicolas Barker and others (London: British Library, 2005), p. 176.
George Tolias, 'Isolarii, Fifteenth to Seventeenth Century', in The History of Cartography, Volume 3: Cartography in the European Renaissance, ed. by David Woodward (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2007), pp. 263-84 (pp. 267-68).
Raymond Clemens and Timothy Graham, Introduction to Manuscript Studies (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2008), pl. 15-12.
Veronica Della Dora, 'Mapping a Holy Quasi-Island: Mount Athos in Early Renaissance Isolarii', Imago Mundi, 60: 2 (2008), 139-65 (pp. 141, 152-53, 160 n. 47, 163).
Nathalie Bouloux, ‘L’Insularium illustratum d’Henricus Martellus’, The Historical Review 9 (2012), 77–94.
- Material Type:
- Archives and Manuscripts
- Legal Status:
- Not Public Record(s)