Vinland map

The Vinland Map is a historical map of the world, their authenticity is doubted by many parts of the professional world. During the parchment certainly stems from the late Middle Ages, the doubt mainly due to the characteristics of the ink used and the question of whether this was produced in the 20th century or in the Middle Ages found. The scientific controversy surrounding the authenticity of the card is still ongoing, and so far no clear evidence in one direction or the other has been rendered.

Content

The Vinland map would be the earliest map that charted a North American coastline and calls a " Bjarni " and a " Leif " as the discoverer of Vinland and therefore America. It shows next to Africa, Asia and Europe three islands in the North Atlantic with the name " Isolanda Ibernica " ( Iceland ), " Grouelanda " (Greenland) and " Vinland " with the text " Vinilanda Insula a Byarno reperta et leipho sociis " ( "The Island Vinland, discovered by the companions Bjarni and Leif ").

In the map on the left above, the following text to read:

Both texts are similar in content largely to the conditions that are preserved in the Icelandic sagas and other sources.

So in several Icelandic Annals for the year 1121 from the search of Erik, Bishop of Greenland, reported to Vinland. An at least approximate match exists in regard to the tenure of Pope Paschal II

Specifically, the assignment of the features mentioned in the above text names to those regarded as historically people in the Icelandic sagas is controversial, with the doubt at least partially based on the controversy surrounding the authenticity of the card.

Origin

The card can be traced back to a bookseller from Barcelona, ​​which they tied together with a late medieval copy of the Historia Tartaorum, offered for sale only to the year 1957. The Historia Tartaorum ( "History of the Tartars ") is a report by the missionary journey of the Franciscan John de Plano Carpini to the Mongols in the years 1245-1247. Lawrence Witten, an antique dealer from Connecticut, purchased the card and the book for $ 3,500.

Made possible by the donation of $ 250,000 of an initially anonymous patron (Paul Mellon ), got the card in 1959 at Yale University. The Yale University started to wage the authenticity of the card and left in 1995 almost unchanged, and without reacting to the criticism has been voiced since then, the first publication to reprint the map of 1965. The insurance value in 1995 valued at 25 million U.S. dollars.

Importance to science

Real or fake?

Whether it is in the card is a modern forgery or whether they can actually date from the 15th century, is highly controversial. Subject of discussion are primarily the following properties of the card and the total manuscript, the parchment, the ink used, fonts, language features and the cartographic representation.

Parchment

The parchment of the map is undoubtedly genuine. Radiocarbon analysis dated it to around 1434. Based matching wormholes, the map and the Historia Tartaorum could be identified as the original components of the Codex, which is mainly a partial copy of the popular "Speculum historiale " of Vincent of Beauvais contained (now Yale, Beinecke Library MS 350). Thus, a previously incomprehensible text fragment on the back of the parchment sheet that the map referred to in improper air nachmittelalterlichem Latin as " delineatio prima pars secunda pars tertia partis speculi ", which can mean about " card, first, second and third part of the speculum " explained without knowledge of the origin of the parchment but makes no sense. Both the "Speculum historiale " and the trip report have been unequivocally written in the mid-15th century on the parchment.

For the 16th century is due to a passage the presence of cards drawings that relate to the previously discovered land in the west suggested. So should a Sir Erlend Thordson have owned a small book with a map in 1568, in which " the boundaries of Markland, Einfœtingjaland ( " Land of Einfüßers " ), and small - Helluland, together with Greenland in the west of where apparently were " recorded the good Terra Florida begins

Characteristics of the font

Since 2004, a second codex is known, the same text compilation contains ( Cistercian Abbey Lucerne, 1340 ) and may have been the template for the Yale copy. A map contains the Lucerne copy, however. Even after palaeographical criteria the map legends of the Vinland Map does not originate from the scribe who copied the two texts. A reputable palaeographic and codicological investigation, as it was called in 1966, has not been induced by the owning library long; therefore it passed massive doubt that the card came simultaneously with the lyrics on the parchment. Thus, the humanistic writing of ae- ligature appeared as a foreign body in the otherwise unaffected humanistic bastard script.

Inks

Also on the card drawing itself uncertainties. The legends of the card and its boundary drawn with a black, the card itself with a brownish ink. Brownish the ink contains titanium dioxide anatase. Electron microscopic studies seemed to suggest that the pigment was not by pulverization, but by precipitation - a method which is applied only since 1923. According to findings from 1987 anatase is however evidence on genuine documents of the 15th century, as it can form from natural mineral components in a particular ink formulation, the iron gall ink. In July 2002, however, it was observed under application of Raman spectroscopy that the card - as opposed to the authentic text of the Codex games - was not made ​​with an iron gall ink, but with an ink based on carbon. This initially seems clear that the drawing of the map can not come from before 1923.

Meanwhile, however, stands for René Larsen, the rector of the conservator School at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts, a report in the journal, according to Der Spiegel, the authenticity of the document beyond doubt: "We have five years of intensive studies found no evidence that the forged Vinland map is " - in particular, have been found since then in the ink particles of anatase, a rare mineral that can form in iron gall ink, but not in carbon- based ink. " The anatase Larsen says come out of the sand, which was strewn to dry it. And the worm holes in the parchment of the map matched those in the cover of that book match, in which she was involved. "

Cartographic presentation

Also from the cartographic representation was closed to the falsity of Vinland map. The card fancy from geographical factors, which were to the 15th century had not yet been known to sailors of the 9th. In particular, the representation of Greenland as an island WOULD anachronistic, since other cards Greenland showed out indefinitely even centuries later than the north. The northern extension of the island was only in 19-20. Century been recorded cartographically. While Iceland and Greenland are reproduced very accurately, Scandinavia show the typical medieval distortions and displacements. The drawing internal structure of Vinland with two bays or fjords is considered for highly atypical; other islands and coastlines are in contrast reproduced very undifferentiated. The three western islands are outside the oval shape, within which are located the other coastal lines. Gestünde one that has an oval shape was intended by the draftsman and considered necessary, then the oval shape would be maintained though. Because the line of this oval shape from the center of the map would have to be thought of along the northern and western lines of the islands. For this to be regarded as an already sufficient motivation in itself for the representation of Greenland and Vinland as islands. These islands could therefore also be regarded as a complement to the oval shape to the north and west.

Furthermore, say proponents of the forgery thesis, even the "modern approach" of the card ( orientation to north) would be in the Latin tradition before the 15th century without precedent.

Linguistic features

Unusual is the fact that the text speaks of an event in the last year of a pope. Normally, the year would be even mentioned as a cardinal number.

805702
de