No Country for Mercator’s Charts

It is well known that Mercator charts took a long time to become a common instrument in the nautical panoply of Early Modern pilots. Gerard Mercator (1512-1594) published his Ad Usum Navigatium—the earliest Mercator projection chart—in 1569, and Edward Wright (1561-1615) his Certain errors in Navigation—containing the relevant mathematical tools for constructing such charts—in 1599, but it was still almost two centuries before European Early Modern pilots decided that they were worth using. Cosmographers and mathematicians of the time blamed this decision on the conservatism and scientific illiteracy of the pilots, a representative case being that of the famous Royal Astronomer Edmond Halley (1656-1742). In the preface to his Atlas Maritimus et Commercialis (1728) one can read:

It is well known that many of our sailors, and some that would be accounted artists are at this day obstinate in the use of the Plain Chart […]. And many of our masters that teach navigation teach what they call plain sailing (and many times that only) to such as are designed to take charge of ships […]. And this they do for no other reason but because they think they can measure distances thereon by a scale of equal parts, rejecting the truly Nautical Chart, commonly called Mercator, because one single scale cannot be fitted to all its parts.

Nova et Aucta Orbis Terrae Descriptio
ad Usum Navigantium Emendate Accommodata, Gerard Mercator (1569)

Historians of navigation and nautical science have echoed such view on this issue until our days. The pilots’ decisions on which charts to use, however, have nothing to do with any kind of “conservatism” or “scientific obscurantism”, but with more complex particularities of their epistemological reality. Stay tuned for more news on this subject soon! [José María Moreno Madrid]

The RUTTER team at the Medea-Chart exhibition “What is a nautical chart, really?”

Medea-Chart: The Medieval and Early Modern Nautical Chart: Birth, Evolution, and Use (ERC-2016-STG/714033) is a research project on the History of Nautical Cartography, funded by the European Research Council. The project started in June 2017 and ended in May 2022 under the lead of the Principal Investigator Dr Joaquim Alves Gaspar at the Interuniversity Centre for the History of Science and Technology (CIUHCT), Faculty of Science of the Universidade de Lisboa.

Medea Chart addressed longstanding inquiries that have baffled cartographic historians for an extended period, employing innovative approaches such as cartometric analysis, numerical modelling, and multispectral analysis of manuscript charts. These questions revolve around the origin, technological progression, and usage of nautical charts in the Middle Ages and Early Modern era. More details about the project and its notable results can be found on their dedicated website. In particular, we strongly suggest having a look at the MEDEA-CHART Database, an online free-of-charge information system dedicated to old nautical charts.

On 15th December, the RUTTER team had the pleasure of attending a tour to the Medea-Chart final exhibition at the Instituto Hidrográfico da Marinha. The thought-provoking title “What is a nautical chart really?” concisely captures the essence of the exhibition hosted in one of the most beautiful spaces in Lisbon, the Convento das Trinas do Mocambo. This architectural conventual gem, echoing a sense of distant lands, transforms the exposition into an engaging interpretative journey. The exposition aims to address and successfully answer technical questions about the production of nautical charts, exploring their evolution with the emergence of oceanic astronomic navigation. Additionally, it provides intricate insights into the sophisticated art of chart-making, delving into the roles of a diverse community of practitioners —pilots, cartographers, and cosmographers— in resolving the inconsistencies found in medieval charts. This evolution is vividly brought to life through captivating representations that guide the visitors. The journey culminates in a practical demonstration of the MEDEA CHART database's functionality—an unparalleled repository of nautical charts worldwide.

We warmly thank Joaquim Gaspar, Šima Krtalić and Bruno Almeida for the explanations and hope that the exhibition will find another location in the next future! [Silvana Munzi & Luana Giurgevich]

An Atlas for a French or an English King? Cosmographical Knowledge and Maritime Expansion

Following our previous post on Travelling Cosmographical Knowledge between Elizabethan England and Valois France, we could not resist mentioning an interesting previous case of Anglo-French cosmographical exchange: that of the Dieppe cartographer Jean Rotz.

Born to a Scottish father and a French mother, Jean Rotz became one of the most well-known French Renaissance cartographers at the Dieppe cartographical school. This school was created at the beginning of the sixteenth century to support French maritime expeditions. One of such expeditions was that of the Parmentier brothers to Asia in 1529. It is unclear whether Rotz participated in it. Still, he became acquainted, either by personal experience or by availing himself of important testimonies from crew members, with important knowledge of several parts of Asia, including the East African coasts, the Persian Gulf, the Indian sub-continent, the Indonesian archipelago and the China sea. Rotz’s knowledge was later enlarged when he made a trip to Brazil in 1539 that allowed him to collect information about South America, the Strait of Magellan, the Caribbean and Africa.

Adding this knowledge of the world to European cartography and general rules for Oceanic navigation, Rotz built up a work entitled Book of Hydrography that he intended to present to the French King Francis I. As the Valois monarch did not appreciate Rotz for his work, the celebrated cartographer crossed the border to England, where he ended up dedicating it to Henry VIII. Rotz’s book is still today preserved (and accessible online) in the British Library. Although Henry VIII did not use immediately the amount of knowledge that Rotz was offering him, he understood the importance of keeping such knowledge in his hands, and he protected Rotz until his death in 1547. Only after this date did Rotz return to France due to the French King Henry II’s patronage of the Dieppe cartographical school.

Rotz’s story is, thus, another episode of this Anglo-French exchange of information. If England did not take immediately Rotz’s knowledge to plan maritime expeditions, one should not forget the importance of such acquisitions to the creation of a scientific milieu favourable to maritime expansion. This was precisely what happened when Henry VIII’s successors supported a full-restart of English maritime plans from the 1550’s onwards. Rotz’s case also underscores the historiographical importance of linking history of science and knowledge approaches with imperial maritime histories, in order to have wider and clear perspectives of the different stages of European maritime expansion. After all, English maritime expansion, like the previous French, Spanish and Portuguese, would hardly have happened without these critical episodes of circulation and acquisition of cosmographical knowledge needed to support such a global endeavour. [Nuno Vila-Santa]

How to Establish a Maritime Route: the Case of the Strait of Magellan (3/3)

Previously on the Trilogy of the Strait of Magellan… Richard Hawkins had crossed the Strait with considerable difficulty in 1594, after which England put on the back burner its interest in the Fuegian channel. Meanwhile, in the Netherlands, the idea of using the Strait as a stable communication path with the East Indies was gaining momentum. To make such a project come true, two “Magellanic companies” were created, one in Rotterdam and another one in Amsterdam, which gathered the money and resources needed to send two expeditions to the Strait in 1599. The Rotterdam one, which departed first, was commanded by Jacob Mahu first, and after his death, by Simon de Cordes; he managed to cross the channel between April and September of the said year. As a result of this expedition, one of the most important technical documents on the navigation of the Strait was produced, which continued to be used for two centuries: the rutter compiled by the pilot Jan Outghersz.

Fig.1. Jan Outghersz’s rutter

The fleet defrayed by the Company of Amsterdam was led by Olivier van Noort, who struggled to cross the Strait on a long journey between November 1599 and February 1600. It was the most violent expedition to the Strait so far, with several episodes of aggression against the natives. The difficulties suffered by both fleets in crossing the channel deterred other companies from sending expeditions down the same route until 1615, when Joris van Spielbergen succeeded in running through the Strait in less than two months, between March and May of that year. The Dutch incursions in the Fuegian passage ended up arousing the concern of Philip III of Spain and II of Portugal, who in 1618 sent a small squadron of two vessels to explore the Strait. In command of the fleet were the brothers Bartolomé García de Nodal y Gonzalo García de Nodal, accompanied by the cosmographer Diego Ramírez de Arellano. The expedition was a resounding success, returning to Lisbon in July 1619 after circumnavigating for the first time the Tierra del Fuego and carrying new and important technical information on the navigation of those waters. Besides, it became the first expedition to the Strait that did not record any casualties.

Fig.2. Map made by Diego Ramírez de Arellano after the expedition

This voyage marked the end of the first century of navigation in the Strait of Magellan, completing a fascinating story of accumulation and circulation of technical nautical knowledge that made the feared Fuegian channel a much more accessible passage for the navigators of the time.

And if you still want to know more about this story, don’t miss the book Atravessando a Porta do Pacifico. Roteiros e Relatos da Travessia do Estreito de Magalhães, 1520-1620 (José María Moreno Madrid & Henrique Leitão, ByTheBook, 2020)! [José María Moreno Madrid]

What is an Oceanic Nautical Rutter in the Renaissance Really?

The straightforward answer would be: it is the technical document that details how to navigate from point A to point B. However, this statement does not draw enough attention to the complexity of nautical rutters. To explain how to navigate from A to B, many other issues have to be dealt with.

Information on winds, currents, tides, shallows, weather conditions, measurements on the declination of the magnetic needle and stories about what happened to other navigators were generally included in rutters. Nautical rutters were also used along with nautical cartography. If nautical charts used the data from nautical rutters to be built, pilots also used nautical charts alongside nautical rutters when sailing. Many rutters are also lively testimonies to the uneasiness caused by the globalizing 16th century development of long Oceanic voyages. In this sense, there are still too many unanswered questions regarding nautical rutters in the Iberian Renaissance.

In many instances rutters were composed by pilots, but were they written during the voyages? Several early 16th-century Iberian nautical rutters suggest that. Nevertheless, as soon as manuscript and printed compilations of rutters circulated, it becomes clear that there were standardized versions of rutters and that some of them were not written on board. In those cases, it is possible that pilots composed rutters on land after returning. Which were the criteria for the writing of those rutters and how could their scientific accuracy be ensured? Were there standard nautical rutters for certain routes, as happened with cartographical models, namely the Portuguese “Padrão Real” or the Spanish “Padrón Real”? How was Iberian nautical knowledge influenced by other maritime traditions, such as the Islamic and others? And finally, what were the critical stages of the knowledge transmission process for the French, the English and the Dutch, who all used Iberian nautical knowledge to start their overseas expansions?

The answer to these interrogations is still to be provided by a study of Iberian nautical rutters, a declared goal of the RUTTER project. However, in the process of answering these main questions, it is inevitable to be struck by the true richness of rutters and their impact on Renaissance science, society and culture. [Nuno Vila-Santa]