IN NORTHERN MISTS 



west. In his later text it is striking that his description 

 of the east coast of Greenland does not reach farther than 

 to his " Thaer promontorium " in 65° 35', while the description 

 of the west coast goes as far north as 72°. This might seem 

 to be connected with real local knowledge, since the latitude 

 65° 35' on the east coast agrees in a remarkable way with the 

 latitude of Cape Dan, 65° 32', where the coast turns in a more 

 northerly direction. To the north of this, the coast is usually 

 blocked with ice, and this place has, therefore, frequently been 

 given as the northern limit of the known east coast, and probably 

 it was there that the Icelanders first arrived off the land on 

 their voyage westward to the Greenland settlements. But 

 this is one of those accidental coincidences that sometimes 

 occur, and that warn us to be careful not to draw too many 

 conclusions from evidence of this nature. ^ We find the 

 explanation in the Medici map (p. 236), where the east coast 

 of the peninsula corresponding to Greenland does not go 

 farther north than to about the same latitude as the promontory 

 on the south side of the broad bay already referred to on 

 the west coast, which promontory Clavus calls Hynth 

 (Hyrch) ; it lies in 65° 40'. As Clavus's coast from this 

 point of the east coast northward had no map to depend on, 

 he did not venture to go farther in his description this time, 

 though in the Nancy map text he goes to 71° with his northern- 

 most cape. 



The Medicean map of the world gives us at the same time 

 a simple explanation of Clavus's designations for the two most 

 northerly points on the west coast of Greenland. If we con- 

 fine ourselves to the scale of latitude for the Medici map, which, 

 as stated above (p. 259), we have found by using Ptolemy's 

 latitudes for more southern places on the map (Gibraltar and 



lit must be remembered that Clavus's latitudes are throughout too high; 

 his south point of Greenland lies about three degrees too far north, in 62° 40' 

 instead of 59° 46'. If we carry this reduction to the most northerly point he 

 describes on the east coast, this will lie in about 62° 30' instead of 65° 35', and 

 thus the coincidence with Cape Dan disappears. His description of the east 

 coast of Greenland in the Nancy map is quite different. 

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