chet van duzer

THE WORLD FOR A KING

p i e r r e d es c e l i e r s’ m a p o f 1 5 50

the british library

32 th e w or ld fo r a ki ng
Fig. 19. Detail of the sea monster of the coast of
Newfoundland, from Pierre Desceliers’ world map
of 1550 (London, British Library, Add. MS 24065).
Fig. 20. Detail of the sea monster of the western coast
of Java la Grande, from Pierre Desceliers’ world map
of 1553, formerly in the library of Johann Nepomuk
Wilczek, now destroyed, in Eugen Oberhummer’s Die
Weltkarte des Pierrre Desceliers, von 1553, Vienna, 1924.
Fig. 21 Detail of the Tower of Babel, from
Pierre Desceliers’ world map of 1550
(London, British Library, Add. MS 24065).
Fig. 22. Detail of the Tower of Babel, from Pierre
Desceliers’ world map of 1553, formerly in the library
of Johann Nepomuk Wilczek, now destroyed, in
Eugen Oberhummer’s Die Weltkarte des Pierrre
Desceliers, von 1553, Vienna, 1924.
Buringh’s estimate that only about 6 percent of iteenth-century manu-
scripts survive.111 We would expect a slightly higher rate of survival among
sixteenth-century manuscripts simply because they are more recent, and
it is tempting to imagine that the rate would be higher still among artisti-
cally elaborate commissions, but on the other hand the large size of some
of the maps produced by Norman cartographers probably reduced their
survival rate.
Diferences between the decorative styles of the 1546 map and the
maps of 1550 and 1553 (on which the cartographer’s signature is intact)
led Henry Harrisee and Helen Wallis to express doubts about whether
the earlier map is really by Desceliers.112 But these diferences are readily
explainable by Desceliers’ use of multiple artists to execute the decorative
elements on his maps. And the similarities between the three maps are
simply overwhelming (igs. 26, 32 and 33). The outlines of the continents
and the place names are similar. The handwriting is the same;113 and even
if the name of the cartographer has been efaced from the signature on
the 1546 map, the style in which the rest of the signature is written is
almost identical to those on the 1550 and 1553 maps. And all three maps
were made in Arques. It is very diicult to imagine that two diferent
cartographers whose work was so similar would be working in the same
town during the same years.
The 1546, 1550, and 1553 maps share one further distinctive stylistic
element which strongly conirms that the three are by the same carto-
grapher – that is, that Desceliers made the 1546 map. On all three maps, the
cartographer employs a special style for depicting unknown or unexplored
coastlines, such as the northern coast of Asia, the coast of Japan, the south-
western coast of South America, and the western part of the hypothetical
southern continent: these coastlines are scalloped, with very short rivers
reaching the coast between adjacent peninsulas (igs. 26, 32 and 33).114 The
other coastlines are depicted in more detail and with a iner texture. The fact
that the maps share this distinctive style in so fundamental a cartographic
element powerfully corroborates that the 1546 map is by Desceliers.115
The atlas of nautical charts in the Morgan Library also displays a
number of important ainities with the maps of Desceliers.116 I confess
p ie r r e desc e lie r s’ map o f 1 5 50 33
that I am mystiied by Sarah Toulouse’s suggestion that it is by Nicolas
Desliens.117 The maps in the Morgan atlas are very diferent from the three
manuscript world maps signed by Desliens that survive: one in Dresden,
dated 1541 but in fact made in 1561 (ig. 14); a smaller map in Paris dated
1566; and a map in Greenwich similar to the Paris map.118 The maps in
the atlas are in a distinct visual style and are elaborately decorated with
mountains, plants, and images of cities, while the maps of Desliens
are more restrained and bear little decoration. The handwriting in the
Morgan atlas is entirely diferent from that of Desliens as well. And just to
look at one geographical detail, on the three maps signed by Desliens no
rivers are indicated lowing into the eastern part of the Caspian, whereas
a river does low into the eastern Caspian on map 10 of the Morgan atlas.
The resemblances between the Morgan atlas and the world maps of
Desceliers are, however, marked. The handwriting in the atlas is consist-
ent with that of Desceliers. The elaborate decoration, with painted moun-
tains, vegetation, and animals, approaches the level of richness that we
see in the works of Desceliers. In particular, the way the mountains are
painted in the Morgan atlas is quite similar to the way they are depicted
on Desceliers’ 1550 map (igs. 24 and 33). This most likely merely indicates
the use of the same contract artist, but it nonetheless suggests a workshop
connection between the atlas and the map. Similarly, maps 2 and 4 of
the Morgan atlas show some primitive huts near Florida and in Canada
(see ig. 23), and these same huts appear on the three surviving maps of
Desceliers: in Canada on his 1546 and 1553 maps; and in Canada as well
as other regions distant from Europe on his 1550 map (see Sections 1, 6,
25, 29, and 34, among others, in the facsimile). There is no other surviv-
ing Norman map that has similar huts, so this feature also connects the
Morgan atlas with Desceliers’ workshop at the very least.119
But the strongest and most intriguing stylistic connection between
the Morgan atlas and Desceliers’ maps is their depictions of unknown
coastlines. The style the Morgan atlas uses for these coasts is not exactly
the same style as that on the 1546, 1550, and 1553 maps, but it is similar.
On map 1 of the Morgan atlas both the northern coast of the southern
continent and the southwestern coast of South America are scalloped,
58 th e w or ld fo r a kin g
Fig. 36. Anonymous and undated Portuguese world
map, made c.1550 (Rome, Biblioteca Vallicelliana,
Invent. Gen. 103).
approach to cartography, correctly asserts that North America is separate
from Asia (see Legend 4 in the Appendix). It is interesting to contrast the
two cartographers’ approaches to politicizing the oceans. Desceliers calls
the northern Atlantic the Mer de France and the Mer Despaigne, but does
not use any symbols, not even lags on ships, to indicate sovereignty or
control over the seas. Vopel, on the other hand, has a large and impressive
portrait of the Holy Roman Emperor and King of Spain, Charles V, in the
Atlantic, another of the Spanish king in the Paciic of the coast of Central
America, and portraits of the King of Portugal of the southern and east-
ern tips of Africa. The control of the seas (and of trade and exploration)
was a much more signiicant issue for Vopel than it was for Desceliers.191
Given that Norman cartographers, including Desceliers, were using
Portuguese cartographic sources, it is important to compare Desceliers’
1550 map with a large and detailed contemporary Portuguese map.
Fortunately such a map exists, in the form of a manuscript nautical chart
that lacks both signature and date, but which was made in about 1550 (ig.
36).192 It measures 109 × 230 cm (3 t 7. in. × 7 ft 7 in.), not far of the dimen-
sions of Desceliers’ map, 135 × 215 cm. The chart is typical of its genre in
its emphasis on coastlines and coastal place names, and its low interest
in the hinterlands; its low level of decoration highlights by contrast the
artistic profusion of Desceliers’ 1550 map. At the same time, its numerous
and prominent lags indicating political control bring into sharper relief
Desceliers’ general avoidance of these same signs.
Like Desceliers, the anonymous Portuguese cartographer shows
little interest in the Paciic. He does depict part of the ocean west of South
America, but Portuguese ships travelled to the riches of Asia (including
the Moluccas which Portugal had acquired from Spain about twenty
years previously) 193 by sailing around Africa and across the Indian Ocean
rather than by crossing the Atlantic, rounding South America, and then
crossing the Paciic. The Portuguese cartographer clearly concentrated on
depicting the parts of the world of greatest interest to his audience, rather
than aiming at a cosmographic completeness, and it is tempting to think
that part of Desceliers’ decision not to emphasize the Paciic resulted from
his use of a Portuguese model.
p ie r r e desc e lie r s’ map o f 1 5 50 59
The Portuguese cartographer is conservative in depicting unknown
regions: he simply omits the unknown coast of southwestern South
America, while Desceliers depicts it but uses his distinctive scalloped
coastline to indicate that it is unknown. The maker of the nautical chart
also declines to paint the southern coast of Java Major, and thus gives
no indication of the size of the island, or whether it might be the north-
ern promontory of a southern continent, as it is on Desceliers’ map (see
Section 27 of the facsimile). The place names on this part of Desceliers’
Terre Australle (which is called Jave la Grande on some other Norman
maps) are in Portuguese, but it is puzzling that neither this Portuguese
nautical chart nor any other surviving contemporary Portuguese map
includes a southern continent similar to those on the Norman maps. The
much-discussed southern continent on the Norman maps requires careful
consideration.
the s outher n conti nent
on norman maps
The one aspect of the Norman maps, including those of Desceliers, that
has attracted the most attention is their depiction in the southeastern
Indian Ocean of a large land mass which is called Java la Grande on some
of the maps. In particular, much ink has been spilled over the question
of whether this land mass relects a European pre-discovery (that is, a
European discovery before that commonly accepted by historians) of
Australia, which is widely held to have been discovered for Europe by
the Dutch navigator Willem Janszoon in 1606.194 The land mass on the
Norman maps is at least in the general area where Australia is situated
(though about 24°, a very large distance, west of Australia’s actual loca-
tion), and a few of its contours are similar to those of Australia, so it is
easy to see how the theory arose. It is best to begin discussion of this ques-
tion with a quick review of the history of cartographic representations of
a southern continent.
The idea that there must be land to the far south, a hypothetical con-
struct without any basis in exploration or discovery, goes back to classical
60 th e w or ld fo r a kin g
antiquity and proved remarkably persistent.195 Developed and given
cartographic expression by Crates of Mallus in the mid-second century
bc, the idea was simpliied by Macrobius in his Commentarii in Somnium
Scipionis (‘Commentary on the Dream of Scipio’) (early ith century ad),
and many medieval manuscripts and early printed editions of Macrobius’
work are illustrated with maps that show a large hypothetical land mass
in the south.196 The earliest non-Macrobian map to depict a southern con-
tinent is a printed world map made in around 1508 by the engraver and
miniature-painter Francesco Rosselli, on which the continent is essen-
tially a large island at the South Pole (ig. 37).197 As one might expect of
a purely hypothetical land mass, the continent took a variety of forms
in the hands of diferent sixteenth-century cartographers: on some maps
and globes it even appears as a large ring around the South Pole.198
Oronce Fine, the French cartographer who would later dedicate to
Henry II his cosmography titled Le sphere du monde (p. 27), in 1531 pub-
lished a double-cordiform world map with a large southern continent that
extends northward almost to the Tropic of Capricorn (ig. 38).199 It bears
the inscription Terra Australis recenter inventa, sed nondu[m] plene cognita
p ie r r e desc e lie r s’ map o f 1 5 50 61
Fig. 37. Hand-coloured exemplar of Francesco
Rosselli’s printed world map of c.1508
(Greenwich, National Maritime Museum, G201:1/53).
Fig. 38. Oronce Fine’s printed world map of 1531
(courtesy of the Rare Book and Special Collections
Division, Library of Congress, Washington DC,
147.03.00).
(‘Southern Land, recently discovered but not yet fully known’) and has
mountains and rivers depicted on it – despite the fact that it is proclaimed
to be little known. The huge peninsula that juts northward east of Africa is
labelled Brasilelie Regio, a confusion with Brazil that derives from the 1515
globe by the German mathematician and cartographer Johann Schöner.
The other large peninsula further to the east on Fine’s map is labelled Regio
Patalis, a part of India mentioned by the Roman encyclopaedist Pliny the
Elder that had been mistakenly transferred south by the theologian and
astrologer Pierre d’Ailly (1351–1420).200 Richard Henry Major interpreted
this latter peninsula as relecting a pre-discovery of Australia.201
Gerard Mercator in his world map of 1538, titled Orbis imago (‘Image
of the world’),202 followed Fine’s 1531 map closely, including his southern
continent; but on his terrestrial globe of 1541, published just three years
later, he shows a very diferent southern continent (ig. 39).203 Mercator
had searched for any report he could ind that seemed to relate to the con-
tinent, and used what he found to modify his earlier image of it. On his
1541 globe, a peninsula juts north towards the southern tip of Africa (this
peninsula does not appear in ig. 29), and a legend informs the viewer
1 2 3 4 5 6 7
FACSIMILE WITH COMMENTARIES

i n t r o d u ct i o n
8 9 10 11 12 13 14 Desceliers’ world map of 1550 is designed to be laid out on a table and viewed from both the bottom (south)
and top (north): the illustrations and texts in the northern part of the map are oriented so as to be viewed
from the north, and those in the south to be viewed from the south. To allow the map to be reproduced at
full size in this book it has been divided into forty-two overlapping sections – in six rows and seven col-
umns – and these sections are printed so as to recreate the experience of viewing the map on a table. That
is, the sections in the top or northern three rows have been rotated 180° so that most of the texts and images

15 16 17 18 19 20 21 are the right way up when viewed on these pages. In the area around the map’s centreline at 11° N, the ig-
ures and texts are not oriented with perfect consistency, and inevitably some elements are upside down in
those sections whether they are viewed from the north or the south.
The division of the map into sections was made to it the format of this book, and does not follow any
division that Desceliers himself had imagined. The numbering of the sections begins in the northwestern
corner of the map, and proceeds to the east until reaching Section 7 in the northeastern corner, Section 8 is
at the beginning of the second row in the west, and so forth. The location of each section of the map is indi-

22 23 24 25 26 27 28 cated by a small index map reproduced with the commentary on each section. An impression of the whole
map is best obtained by consulting the fold-out in the back pocket, in which the whole map is reproduced
at about 60% of its original size.
The commentaries on each section of the map provide, where appropriate, summaries of the twenty-
six long descriptive texts on the map, but it should be emphasized that these are only summaries, and that
the reader is encouraged to consult the full transcriptions and translations of those texts which are supplied
in the Appendix (pp. 162–73).
29 30 31 32 33 34 35

36 37 38 39 40 41 42
14 4 t h e w o r l d fo r a k i n g

s ect i o n 34
i n d i a n o c e a n a n d w est e r n j av e l a g r a n d e ( n o rt h at to p )

The ship is the most elaborate on the map, with eight sailors depicted on its deck and in its rigging. The
huge northward-jutting peninsula here, parts of which appear in Sections 27, 28, 34, and 35, is called Jave
la Grande on other Norman maps, and is one of these maps’ most intriguing and controversial features.
Several authors have argued that it represents a European pre-discovery of Australia, but their arguments
are not convincing (see p. 72). It is important to emphasize that the illustrations of idolatry and cannibalism
in this land mass do not derive from any text about Jave la Grande, but instead pertain to other regions (the
island of Java and Angama, respectively), and are placed here – much like the legends – to take advantage
of blank space. The coast of the peninsula is depicted using a modiied version of Desceliers’ convention
for unknown coasts: the scalloping here is more irregular than elsewhere, although the periodic very short
rivers have been retained. The place names along this coast appear to be invented (see p. 69). There are two
more groups of the huts that the cartographer uses to indicate the dwellings of primitive peoples. Near the
upper edge of this section there is a striking scene of idolatry: three kneeling men worship the sun and an
idol of a bull-like demon. This scene was inspired by the text describing Java (the island, rather than Jave la
Grande), which is just to the right of this image (see Section 28, and Legend 19 in the Appendix). Desceliers
takes advantage of the blank space in the hypothetical southern continent as a location for a series of texts
describing other, far-distant regions: Pego is the kingdom of Pegu in modern Burma (see Section 20); and
Melasque is the trading centre to the east of Sumatra labelled Mellaque (modern Malacca) (see Section 27).
In the lower right-hand part of this section there is a scene of cannibalism in which the actors are cyno-
cephali, or dog-headed people, a powerful combination of moral and physical monstrosity. This image per-
tains not to Jave la Grande where it is located, but to the Andaman Islands, near Burma, and illustrates the
descriptive text about the islands in Section 35 (see Section 20, and Legend 23 in the Appendix). Desceliers
based his image on the cannibalistic Andaman Islanders in the modern map of eastern India in either the
1522, 1525, 1535, or 1541 editions of Ptolemy’s Geography (ig. 68), but was then inspired by some Asian cyno-
cephali cannibals depicted on the page following the eleventh map of Asia in the 1522 edition of Ptolemy to
make his islanders dog-headed (ig. 69). The latter image does not appear in the 1525, 1535, or 1541 editions
of Ptolemy. It does feature in Lorenz Fries’ Uslegung der Mercarthen oder Carta Marina (a pamphlet irst pub-
lished in 1525 to accompany a large world map), but there it purports to depict residents of the New World. Fig. 68. Detail of cannibals from the Andaman Islands, from the
So we can be conident in this case that Desceliers was consulting the 1522 edition of Ptolemy. modern map of eastern India in Ptolemy’s Geography, Strasbourg, 1522
(British Library, Maps C.1.d.11.).

Fig. 69. Detail of cannibal cynocephali, from the page following the
eleventh map of Asia in the 1522 edition of Ptolemy’s Geography
(British Library, Maps C.1.d.11.).
1 62
APPENDIX
t h e 1 5 50 m a p ’s lo n g l eg e n d s
In this section the twenty-six long legends on Desceliers’ 1550 map are
transcribed and translated, and their sources analysed. In earlier schol-
arship this essential part of the map, and of Desceliers’ efort to convey
information to his map’s viewers, has remained largely uninvestigated.
I discussed the long legends on the 1550 map in the introduction to the
map earlier (see pp. 50–1), and for convenience I repeat here the main
points of that discussion.
One tends to think of the legends that describe diferent regions, peo-
ples, animals, or goods of trade as integral parts of the maps that contain
them, but in fact these long legends were an optional feature of nauti-
cal charts, something for which the person commissioning the map no
doubt paid more, just as he or she would have paid more for artistic deco-
rations such as sea monsters and images of cities. This is demonstrated
by many pairs of nautical charts by the same cartographer, one of which
has descriptive legends, and the other not. In the case of Desceliers’ 1550
map, it is tempting to think that Claude d’Annebault decided to include
the legends in the commission speciically in order to set the map apart
from others that Henry II already owned, including the anonymous atlas
of about 1538–45 in The Hague, the Harleian map of about 1542–4, and the
1546 map by Desceliers now in the John Rylands Library. It does not seem
possible to know whether the large number of legends on the 1550 map
that relate to Asia was the result of a speciic request by Annebault, or a
result of Desceliers’ interest in that region, which was much stronger than
that of other Norman cartographers.
The descriptive legends on medieval nautical charts are traditional,
copied from one chart to another, but the legends on Desceliers’ 1550
map are the fruit of book study, rather than being part of this tradition.
Many of Desceliers’ legends were culled from the narratives of the famous
travellers Marco Polo (c.1254–1324), Ludovico di Varthema (c.1470–1517),
and Amerigo Vespucci (1454–1512). In fact the texts of Polo, Varthema,
and Vespucci were available to Desceliers in one book, the Novus orbis
regionum ac insularum ueteribus incognitarum, edited by Simon Grynaeus
and Johann Huttich, and published twice in 1532, in Basel by Johann
Herwagen, and in Paris by Antoine Augerelle for Jean Petit (the edition
that will be used here), and again in 1537. Parts of a few of Desceliers’ leg-
ends (those on the pygmies, Ethiopia, and Africa, see Legends 2, 16, and 17
below) derive from another work in the Novus orbis, Sebastian Münster’s
Typi cosmographici et declaratio et usus.
Most of Desceliers’ other descriptive legends (those on the Amazons,
Arabia, Asia, Africa, and Ethiopia, Legends 6, 9, 10, 16, and 17 below) were
culled from supplementary, non-Ptolemaic descriptive texts in the 1522
(Strasbourg), 1525 (Strasbourg), 1535 (Lyon), or 1541 (Vienna) edition of
Ptolemy’s Geography. In addition, he copied bits of text and images from
some of the maps in one of these editions of Ptolemy (see the commentary
on Legends 5, 11, 17, 19, and 23).
Thus the vast majority of Desceliers’ twenty-six legends come from
two books, the Novus orbis and an edition of Ptolemy’s Geography. Just
two of the legends, those in North America (Legends 1 and 2) come from
other sources, speciically accounts of the voyages of Cartier and Roberval
to Canada. Desceliers’ use of just two principle sources is very diferent
from the practice of some other cartographers who created maps with spe-
cially written legends. Those on Fra Mauro’s mappamundi of around 1455,
for example, are the fruit of prodigious study; and Martin Waldseemüller,
in making his Carta marina of 1516, used many diferent sources, which
he listed in a long text-block in the lower let corner of the map.247 On
the other hand, Caspar Vopel in composing the legends for his world map
of 1545 made heavy use of the Novus orbis, just as Desceliers was to do.
Desceliers did good work in assembling the legends for his 1550 map, but
his goals for the undertaking were not as ambitious as those of some other
cartographers.
I hope that this examination of the sources of Desceliers’ legends will
shed light not only on the details of the 1550 map, and its relationship with
other sixteenth-century maps, but also on the methods, predilections, and
indeed the library of Desceliers, about whom we otherwise know so little.
Desceliers’ legends are presented in the following order: North
America (Legends 1–2), South America (Legend 3), northern Europe
(Legends 4–5), continental Asia (Legends 6–15), Africa (Legends 16–17),
and southeast Asia (Legends 18–26).248
n o rth am e r i ca
l eg e n d 1 (on Sections 1, 2, 8 and 9 of the facsimile)
t r a n s c r i p t i o n 249
Canada
Cest la demonstracion daulcuns pays descouuertz puisnagueres pour et aux
despens du tres chretien Roy de france francoys premier de ce nom. Lung
nomme Canada Ochelaga et Sague assis vers les parties occidentalles environ
par les 50 degrez de latitude. A iceulx pays a este enuoye (par ledict Roy) hon-
neste et ingenieux gentil homme monsieur de Roberual auec grande com-
paignye de gentz desprit tant gentilz hommes comme aultres, et auec iceulx
grande compaignye de gentz criminelz desgrades pour habiter le pays lequel
auoit este primierement descouuert par le pilote Jaques cartier demeurant
a sainct malo. Et pource que ilz na este possible (auec les gentz dudict pays)
faire traique a raison de leur austerite, intemperance dudict pays et petit
proit sont retournes en France esperant y retourner quand il plaira au Roy.
t r a n s l at i o n
Canada
This is the image of some countries recently discovered for and by provision of
the very Christian King of France, Francis, the irst of that name. Their names
are Canada Ochelaga and Sague to the west, at around 50 degrees of latitude.
To this country the King sent the honest and clever gentleman Monsieur de
Roberval with a large group of men of spirit, both gentlemen and others, and
with these a large group of degraded criminals to inhabit that land which had
irst been discovered by the pilot Jacques Cartier, departing from St Malo. And
because it was impossible to trade with the men of that country because of
their poverty and the bad weather there and the small proit, they returned to
France, hoping to return there when it should please the King.
c o m m e n ta ry
This is one of the earliest appearances of the name ‘Canada’ on a map; the ear-
liest is probably that on the Harleian map of about 1542–4, given that that the
correct date of Nicolas Desliens’ chart in Dresden is 1561 rather than 1541.250
‘Ochelaga’ is Hochelaga, a fortiied Iroquois village near the site of modern
Montreal, and ‘Sague’ is Saguenay, a mythical Native American kingdom
which was supposed to contain ample gold, and which the French were very
interested in inding.251 This legend represents Desceliers’ most signiicant
attempt to include textual information about recent discoveries on his chart:
Jacques Cartier and Roberval (more fully Jean-François de La Rocque, sieur
de Roberval) made coordinated but essentially separate voyages to Canada
in 1541–3.252 The Harleian map includes an image of Cartier in Canada during
an earlier voyage;253 Roberval and the fortiied settlement of France-Roy from
the voyage of 1541–3 are depicted on map 9 of the Vallard Atlas of 1547 (ig.
13);254 and it is Roberval who is depicted above and to the right of the legend
about Canada on Desceliers’ 1550 map. Thus depictions of Cartier or Roberval
exploring in Canada seem to have been a traditional element of Norman
mapmaking.
p ie r r e desc e lie r s’ map o f 1 5 50 163
l eg e n d 2 (on Section 8 of the facsimile)
t r a n s c r i p t i o n 255
Pigmeons
Cy dessus est la demonstracion dung peuple nomme pigmeons gens de petite
stature, comme dune couldee. au troysiesme an ilz engendrent et au 8e ilz
meurent non ayans deuant les yeulx honte justice ou honnestete. pour ceste
cause sont dictz brutes non hommes. On tient quilz ont guerre continuelle
contre les oyseaulx nommes grues.
t r a n s l at i o n 256
Pygmies
Above is an illustration of a people called pygmies, a people of small stature,
of about a cubit. At the age of three they procreate and at the age of eight
they die without having before their eyes shame, justice, or honesty. For this
reason they are called brutes, not men. It is said that they are constantly at war
with the birds called cranes.
c o m m e n ta ry
The pygmies and their battle with the cranes are irst mentioned by Homer, in
a simile at the opening of book 3 of the Iliad, and they subsequently reappear
in many other authors ancient, medieval, and early modern.257 Desceliers’ leg-
end’s denial that pygmies are human is unusual, and points to its ultimate
source, the De animalibus (7.1.6.62) of the thirteenth-century philosopher
and theologian Albertus Magnus.258 However, Desceliers took the informa-
tion about the pygmies not directly from Albertus Magnus, but rather from
the unattributed citation of Albertus Magnus’ description in the section ‘De
Africa’ in Sebastian Münster’s Typi cosmographici et declaratio et usus, the open-
ing work in Desceliers’ source for several other legends, the Novus orbis. The
curious thing about Desceliers’ pygmies is, of course, that they are located in
the New World, rather than Africa, which is where the Münster places them,
or in Asia, which is where most other sources situate them. This is an interest-
ing case of the migration of the ‘monstrous races’ to the New World.259 Their
presence in North America was perhaps inspired by Jacques Cartier’s report,
in his account of his second voyage made in 1535–6, that Donnacona, ‘King
of Canada’, told him that there were ‘Picquemyans’, or pygmies, in Canada.260
Thus Desceliers took the idea that there were pygmies in the New World
from one source (Cartier’s second voyage), and his description of them from
another (the Novus orbis). Desceliers’ 1546 map has pygmies ighting cranes in
eastern Asia; but his map of 1553 also depicts its pygmies in North America.
Guillaume Le Testu in his Cosmographie universelle of 1556, one of the few
Norman cartographic works to include Asia, depicts the pygmies battling the
cranes in that continent, their traditional location.261