Hic sunt gigantes? Patagonia in the Golden Age of Dutch Cartography.

MARTINEZ, CAROLINA

Amsterdam

Conferencia; International Conference on the History of Cartography (ICHC).; 2019

Imago Mundi, University of Amsterdam

This paper examines the development of a specific set of cartographic images for the Strait of Magellan produced in the Dutch Republic between 1600 and 1650. It proposes that the Dutch voyages to the scarcely known coasts of Patagonia between the late 16th and early 17th centuries were significant in the elaboration of long lasting visual motifs, which combined both imaginary and historical elements drawn from the travelers s on-the-ground experience. Special attention will be paid to the printed maps of America made by Willem Janszoon Blaeu (America Nova Tabula, 1617), Nicolaes Visscher (Americae Nova Descriptio, 1614) and Jan Jansoon (America noviter delineata, 1623), in contrast with the Spanish and English narratives and maps on the area. The presentation will thus analyze the context of production of the textual and visual images on the Magellanic-Fuegian area included in the Dutch travel narratives of the early 17th century and their transposition into cartographic images.Owing to its intricate geography and the difficulties for navigation, during the Early Modern period knowledge of the Magellanic-Fuegian area was scarce and scattered in the travel accounts of the Spanish, Dutch and English attempts to sail through the Strait. A specific iconography for the Patagonian region consolidated, however, in the Golden Age of Dutch cartography. Starting in 1581, the United Provinces encouraged the exploration of the South Seas in search of an alternative interoceanic southwest passage that would allow trade with the Far East. The navigation of the unexplored Patagonian coasts as well as the attempts to sail past the Strait paid off in editorial terms as the accounts of the Dutch voyages to the South Seas were hastily printed across Europe. In 1602, the De Bry family and the Frankfurt publisher Levinus Hulsius capitalized on previous editorial efforts and included in their respective travel compilations the southern voyage of Sebald de Weert (1598-1600). Willem Schouten and Joris van Spilbergen s travel accounts would be printed soon after their voyages of circumnavigation, in 1618 and 1619 respectively. These texts and images were, in turn, appropriated by Dutch cartographers, who soon produced and diffused a new iconographic synthesis of Patagonia and its mythical inhabitants. In 1526, Antonio Pigafetta had mentioned the existence of giants in his account of the first circumnavigation of the globe. It was the Dutch cartographers, however, who consolidated a specific and lasting iconographic repertoire for the area.