Novus orbis regionum ac insularum.… [News of the regions and islands of the world.…].
Johann Huttich, comp., with preface by Simon Grynäus.
Basel: Johannes Heruagium, 1532.
Jay I. Kislak Collection, Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress (148)
The Sixteenth-Century World
This early anthology of the lands and peoples of the Americas includes letters and descriptions of the voyages of Marco Polo, Christopher Columbus, and Amerigo Vespucci. A truly remarkable feature of the work is a world map, possibly drawn by Sebastian Münster, and, in part, by Hans Holbein the Younger. The Americas are clearly depicted, based partly on the world as configured by the Johann Schöner globes or on Petrus Apianus’s map of 1520 and showing the influence of the ideas of Copernicus. The scenes and vignettes that surround the oval projection are particularly interesting images, reflecting European views of this new world as a place where cannibals, monsters, and other dangers lurked.