IN NORTHERN MISTS 



now preserved in the so-called " Medicean Marine Atlas," of 

 1351, at Florence.^ In addition to these, either the Bruges 

 itinerary itself (Itineraire Brugeois), [cf. Storm, 1891, p. 19], 

 or one of its earlier sources. Possibly he also had, in part 

 at all events, a tract (in Icelandic?) that is included in the 

 fourth part of the "Rymbegla" (1780); that he also knew 

 of the Icelandic sailing directions, as assumed by Bjornbo 

 and Petersen, I regard as less certain, although not impossible; 

 perhaps it would be safer to suppose that he may have seem 

 some statements from Ivar Bardsson's description of Green- 

 land, in an itinerary, for instance. I have not been able to 

 find any certain indication of his having been acquainted 

 with the Icelandic geography mentioned on p. 237; perhaps 

 he may rather have known of the land connection between 

 Greenland and Russia from some tale or other, or from a 

 legendary saga;^ from the same source (or from Ivar Bards- 

 son's description?) may also be derived the name " Nordbotn " 

 (cf. p. 171, note i), which is not known in the Icelandic geog- 

 raphy, but which seems most probably to be a legendary form. 

 Certain names, such as those of the bishops' sees in Norway 

 and Iceland, Clavus may easily have found in the papal archives 

 in Rome. 



In the first place, exactly following Ptolemy, the draughts- 

 man has marked Ireland with the islands around it, and six 



1 Storm [1891, p. 16] was the first to hold that Clavus made use of Italian 

 compass-charts as his model for the delineation of the south coast of 

 Scandinavia, and that he also took names from them. Bjornbo and Petersen 

 have rejected this view, as the names in Clavus's text are principally taken 

 from other sources, and the Baltic has been given quite a different shape. 

 But the necessity of this change seems to have escaped them, as it was caused 

 by Clavus retaining Ptolemy's outline for the south coast of the Baltic. 



" If we assume that the names " Wildhlappelandi," " Pigmei," etc., on the 

 Nancy map are due to Clavus himself, he may have had some authority like 

 that of the anonymous letter to Pope Nicholas V. (of about 1450), which 

 Michel Beheim may also have used (see later). From this source he may 

 have obtained the information about the land connection between the land to 

 the north-east of Norway and Greenland. As will be mentioned later (p. 270), 

 it is possible that this source was Nicholas of Lynn. 

 256 



