AMERICAN NOTES. 115 



One of these maps was engraved in the year 1666. As 

 we at the present day do not know of any large 

 island in the same longitude and latitude, so it is a 

 question what to think of it. Can there have been such 

 an island ? Dr. Mortimer related that he had talked 

 about it with several old sea captains, and one of them 

 had told him that when he had sailed in about the same 

 longitude and latitude as the old maps had placed 

 Friesland, he had found there a much shallower water 

 than elsewhere, indeed in some places so shallow that he 

 had not ventured to proceed in that direction ; for the 

 rest, all sea captains had said that at the present time 

 there is no land, island, or anything of the kind seen there. 

 May there not formerly have been a large island which 

 has since sunk ?* 



* Friesland or Frisland, one of the phantom islands of the North 

 Atlantic, has been the subject of much speculation among geographers. The 

 first suggestion of the island upon the map, appears on the-Edrisi map, 1154, 

 (Tabula rotunda Rogeriana) where a considerable island is shown to the north 

 of England and Ireland marked " Resland." Next on the oval diagram known 

 as the Imago Mundi of Ranulfus de Hyggeden, 1360, an island called 

 " Wrislad," appears with Noravega, Islanda and Tile. Lelewel considers 

 with some show of reason that "Resland "and "Wrislad" represent Frislanda 

 (Geog. du Moyen Age. vol. iii. p. 101, n.). On the Genoese Pizigani map, 

 1367, is an island opposite to the south-west coast of Norway, called 

 "Sialanda;" an island in a corresponding position is shown on the Catalane 

 map, 1375, and on the map of Fredrici d' Ancone, 1497, (Wolfenbutel) named 

 " Stillanda,'' and this island on both these maps bears a legend, stating that 

 the inhabitants speak the language of Norway and are Christians. This name 

 " Stillanda " has been read by some modern geographers as " Frislanda." 

 There can be no doubt, however, as to the correct reading, if either the 

 original Catalane map, preserved in the Bibliotheque Nationale in Paris, or 

 the fine photographic facsimile published by Delisle "Documents Geogra- 

 phiques, 1883," (Brit. Mus. S. 35, 5, sheet 16), is referred to. The facsimile 

 of the Catalane map in Santarem's Atlas (Brit. Mus., Tab. 1850, a. pi. xiii), 

 gives the same reading, but is not so clear. Lelewel reads it " Scillante." 

 The Pizigani map is given in Jomard (Brit. Mus , S. II. I. map. x.) and the 

 Wolfenbutel map in Santarem's Atlas (Brit. Mus., Tab. 1850, a. page 74.) The 

 names and positions' of the Island "Sialanda" or "Stillanda," in the three 



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