66 BALCH— EVOLUTION AND MYSTERY 



veloped by Senor Batalha-Reis.^ Here I wish to merely recapitulate 

 briefly the chief arguments of these scholars. 



Andrea Biancho's map is on vellum 86 centimeters by 63 cen- 

 timeters. It is now in the Ambrosian Library at Milan and its 

 authenticity is generally accepted. It is one of the portolani, that 

 is one of the maps made by seaman for seamen for practical pur- 

 poses and free from the fanciful geographical conceptions and 

 fabulous zoological monstrosities of the maps drawn by convent 

 monks. The map takes in France, Spain and the African coast 

 down to Cape Verde, and, as far as known, is the first record of the 

 coast line of Cape Verde. 



The remarkable feature of the map, however, is that at the ex- 

 treme lower left hand corner is represented an extensive coast line 

 southwest of Cape Verde. On this an inscription in the old Vene- 

 tian dialect seems to read : " ixola otinticha xe longa a ponente 

 1500 mia," which may be translated: "Authentic island distant to 

 the south west 1500 miles." The position of the coast line and the 

 legend together seem to show that somebody, before the year 1448, 

 had seen a land southwest of Cape Verde and some 1,500 miles 

 distant. But there is no island in this position, while at 1,520 miles 

 southwest of Cape Verde is the northeast promontory of South 

 America. 



There is no known account recording any voyage making such a 

 discovery, therefore it is well to see whether there is any indirect 

 evidence that such a discovery might have been made. In the first 

 place there were a great number of voyages in search of lands 

 during the fifteenth century. Then we must remember moreover 

 that some of these voyages were not recorded and were sometimes 

 entirely forgotten. It is, therefore, perfectly possible that such a 

 discovery may have been made and left unrecorded if, for instance, 

 it was made by some merchant vessel or fishing boat blown out to 

 sea. Indeed this very thing happened in this very place in the year 

 1500, when Cabral's expedition, en route for India round the Cape 

 of Good Hope, was blown out to sea and strayed over in a casual 



^ " The Supposed Discovery of South America before 1448 and the 

 Critical Methods of Historians of Geographical Discovery," The Geograph- 

 ical Journal, February, 1897. 



