A lovely example of Berlinghieri’s Ptolemaic map of the Caucasus, showing Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan and parts of Turkey and Iran. It is the third printed map of the region.
Francesco di Niccolo Berlinghieri completed the Septe Giornate della Geografia in about 1479, as a paraphrase of Ptolemy’s geographical text in Italian verse, in which he combined classical and contemporary texts; he illustrated the text with thirty-one maps, twenty-seven based on Ptolemy, with four modern maps. The volume was printed in 1482, and is regarded as the third printed atlas of the world, after the 1477 Bologna and 1478 Rome editions.
This Ptolemaic map of the Caucasus is drawn on Marinus’ plane projection; as such it is the only one of the early Ptolemaic maps to be drawn on his original projection, with equidistant meridians and parallels.
This example appears to be from the third issue (sometimes called the second edition), circa 1520-25, but all printings are rare.
Campbell, Earliest Printed Maps, 168.
