242 Proceedings of the Royal Irish A cadcmy. 



at Upsala (Per. xix), shows the large round " Y. de Berzil," opposite the 

 Blaskets, and a nameless island (Asmanda) to the south of it. Bianco also 

 marks " Antilia " and the " Y. de la Man " (Per. xx). The islands reappear, I 

 believe, without names, in tlie planisphere of Johannes Leardus, 1448 (along 

 with nameless isles in the position of Brazil and Asmaidas); while 

 Gratiosus Benincasa marks Daithuli, Isolo de Bracill, and " Isle dita Mate " as 

 lying round Ireland (Per. xxxiii and p. 61) in 1467. One of the finest maps 

 before Columbus, that of Era- Mauro (there is a full-sized facsimile in the 

 Library of Trinity College, Dublin), in 1459,' identified Brasil with the 

 Fortunate Islands, " I. del Berzel, anesta isola de hibernia, son dite Fortunata," 

 marking it due west from the Dingle Peninsula. Mauro was known as the 

 " Cosmographus iucomparabilis " ; he was a Yenetian friar, and a medal was 

 stmck in his honour. In 1482-6 the " Ptolemaeus Ulmae " (Fac. xsix) maps' 

 give the Fortunate Isles, and what is possibly the first printed allusion to 

 St. Brendan, " Brandianus magnae abstinentiae vir de Scocia " ; the map is 

 also interesting for marking Atlanticum, an island off the African coast. To 

 this century belongs a Catalan compass chart, given by Nordenskiold 

 (Plate V) ; it marks Ylle de braziU a double island and (twice as far from 

 Irlanda as it) another BraziU to the west of it, Ilia Yerde, and still further 

 to the north, " Fixland," apparently Iceland.^ In 1490 the "Ptolemaeus," 

 published at Eome (Fac. ui), marks Deorum Insule off Xorth Portugal. In 

 the very year when Columbus first reached the islands of America, 

 Martin Behaim (or Bohemus) of Nui'nburg made his famous globe. It shows 

 Brasil and St. Brendan's Isle, the latter half-way between Ireland and Japan 

 (Cipango), in 1492. In 1481 he had come to Portugal and worked vmder the 

 patronage of John II. He returned home in ten years, but again \'isited 

 Lisbon, where he died in 1506. 



If interest in geography was getting so keen and bearing fruit in the 

 Portuguese expeditions down the coast of Africa, and the Spanish ones to the 

 West Indies, it might be expected that it grew keener than ever after the 

 great turning-point in history of that year, when " Columbus gave a New 

 World to Castile and Leon." Two names passed from mythic and half -mythic 

 islands ; " Brazil " and " Antilia " attached themselves to actual countries ; but 

 though Antilia passed from the map of the Old World, Brazil still held its 

 own off the Irish coast, though its name had been transferred to the land of 

 the giant river and forests, greater and more beautiful than bard or monk 



1 Given on Plate XX. 



^ By Leonard Hoi ; it was offeied by Kicholas Germain to Pope Paul II. 



' Plate XX. 



