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Section of the Indian Ocean map from the Atlas Miller c.1519
Ships from the Indian Ocean map
from the Atlas Miller c.1519
Geopolitical Counter-information for the
Eyes of a Prince (or Princess): Miller Atlas and the Age of Discoveries 1519
Alfredo Pinheiro Marques
Director of the Centro de Estudos do Mar Luís de
Albuquerque
article and graphic from Moleiro.com
The dying days of the Middle Ages and the dawn of the Renaissance brought with
them the greatest geographical revolution in the history of mankind. The late
fifteenth and early sixteenth century were the age of King Joao II, Portugal's
'Perfect Prince' and of his successor King Manuel I. These were also the years
of King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella (the Catholic monarchs), an era that was
to continue with the reign of Emperor Charles V, his heir.
It was
in this period – during the forty years between the Portuguese voyages of 1480-1485
by the Luso-Galician Diogo Cao (to Africa, beyond Guinea) and the Castilian voyage
in 1519-1522 by the Portuguese Ferdinand Magellan (to the Pacific and around the
globe) – that the major expeditions took place:
Bartolomeu Dias 1487-1488
(Cape of Good Hope);
Christopher Columbus 1492-1493 (the unknown lands of
the West subsequently baptised America);
Paulo and Vasco da Gama 1497-1499
(Indian Ocean and India);
Amerigo Vespucci in 1499-1501 (the New World,
which he reconnoitred with men from Castile and Portugal, which is why these lands
were named after him), etc.
Hence from Joao II to Charles V, in the
life of a single generation between 1480 and 1520, the essence of the great, mutual
geographic discoveries and great intercontinental encounters between civilisations
happened.
Cartography – the 'science of princes' – reflected this
extraordinary explosion of geographical and anthropological knowledge, exotically
illustrated with luxurious and exuberant artistic illuminations. The most outstanding
outcome of this renovation of the 'Image of the World', in which art and science
joined forces, is evident in the Portuguese atlas now housed in the Bibliotheque
Nationale de France in Paris, known as the Atlas Miller (c. 1519-1522), by the
cartographers Lopo Homem, Pedro Reinel and Jorge Reinel and the miniaturist Antonio
de Holanda.
This veritable masterpiece with its geographic innovations
and sumptuous artwork portrays the forty years that changed the world on the eve
of Ferdinand Magellan's circumnavigation of the globe. This is why it was always
deemed to be the most important atlas of world cartography from the time of the
great geographical discoveries and is the pride and joy of the Departement des
Cartes et Plans in the Bibiotheque Nationale de France. The studies in the commentary
volume of an identical reproduction by M. Moleiro editor offer remarkably fresh
insights, shedding new light and changing forever not only the knowledge to date
of this masterpiece of cartography and Renaissance art but also, in more general
terms, what was known until now about the origins and early days of the cartography
of the Portuguese discoveries (15th and 16th centuries).
This cartography
is studied here with an in-depth analysis of its first known 'school', the school
constituted by Pedro Reinel and his son Jorge Reinel, reaching the conclusion
that these two men – the first cartographers to chart the geographic discoveries
of the West and the European colonial expansion – were Portuguese of African origin
and therefore referred to as black by their contemporaries.
As regards
the exceptional geographic meaning of this atlas, what was always considered to
be the 'mystery' of this famous work of cartography is now revealed. According
to the theory put forward here, the Atlas Miller is an instrument of geographic
and geopolitical counterinformation. It is the graphic expression of the Portuguese
strategic vision of the globe intended to counter the vision upheld by Castile,
for the peculiar 'neo-Ptolemaic' concept it features, with the sea as stagnon
(the oceans surrounded by land, the New World as a continent, the mythical Austral
Land, etc), suited the Portuguese in c.1519 because it suggested that it was not
possible to sail westwards across to the other side of the planet, i.e. to do
what was attempted first by Columbus and subsequently achieved by Ferdinand Magellan.
This is why the Portuguese ostentatiously, splendidly and officially accepted
and disseminated this concept.
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 Atlas Miller planisphere
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The 'secret' of the Atlas Miller is that it attempts to contradict the idea that
the circumnavigation of the globe is possible. It tries to thwart the project
being prepared at exactly the same time by Ferdinand Magellan. This atlas was
made 'to be contemplated by certain Luso-Castilian, courtly circles particularly
susceptible to circulating information intended for Castilian courtly circles'.
Hence the cartography historians who were surprised by the blunders in the 'incorrect'
mappa mundi (map of the world) in the Atlas Miller some time ago, were
right. In some respects, this mappa mundi is indeed 'incorrect' (despite
being true).
However, the historians who declared that it was correct
and contemporary, and that it had originally formed part of a single codex along
with regional charts, and that it was made by the same people involved in producing
and decorating those regional portolan charts were also right. The mappa mundi
in the Atlas Miller is 'incorrect' because it was made this way deliberately,
in the same period by the real authors. It is a geopolitical fake depicting the
Portuguese strategy of 1519 designed to counter the Castilian strategy.
The Atlas Miller is an unusually splendid work, for its pages, decorated by a
Flemish miniaturist and brimming with Flemish style illustrations, were commissioned
by old D. Manuel, the 'Pepper King', for the type of person for whom Flemish books
of hours were usually intended in that period: a Flemish princess. And the Flemish
princess in question was the sister of Emperor Charles V, Leonor, the princess
who was once betrothed to the crown prince of Portugal (the future Joao III),
but who married D. Manuel in the end after he stole his son's fiancee. Their marriage
lasted almost three years until he widowed her in 1521. The very fact that the
Atlas Miller was left unfinished, between 1519 and c.1522, with pages twenty and
twenty-one incomplete, confirms that D. Manuel 'the Fortunate' did not send it
abroad as a gift of state for a European dignitary such as the king of France.
This work, begun in 1519, was intended quite simply for Leonor, his young wife
and the sister of the sovereign of neighbouring Castile, Emperor Charles V, in
whose service Ferdinand Magellan had been working since 1518 – the badly-treated,
Portuguese exile preparing to sail around the world in the service of the Castilians,
those appreciated neighbours, rival brothers and cordial competitors.
This time, cartography, or the 'science of princes', was intended for a princess.
'Cherchez la femme' as the French say. The reason was not merely fondness of the
arts or love itself. It is now also revealed that this atlas, so strange and lavish
and intended for the eyes of Emperor Charles V and the men of Castile, was in
fact an instrument of geostrategic, geopolitical and diplomatic counterinformation
that even featured nautical mystification.
The Atlas Miller is the
last Portuguese attempt to thwart Columbus's plan. This atlas was created to counter
the voyage by Ferdinand Magellan, and the voyage by Ferdinand Magellan was done
to counter the Atlas Miller. And what is remarkably surprising – really amazing
– is the fact that for several months in 1519, travelling to and fro across the
frontier, the same cartographers took part in both projects, producing the Atlas
Miller in Lisbon and preparing the voyage by Magellan in Seville: Pedro Reinel
and his son Jorge Reinel! When analysed from a scientific and critical viewpoint,
the truth really is stranger than fiction.
These two men, Pedro and
Jorge Reinel, were the two finest cartographers of their times. It was on the
basis of their knowledge that the first circumnavigation of the globe was prepared
for the Crown of Castile. It was also more or less at the same time, in that extraordinary
year of 1519, that the Atlas Miller, which can be said to be the most important
atlas in the history of the cartography of the European geographic discoveries,
was produced for the Crown of Portugal, also on the basis of their knowledge.
A work of this nature, combining the most advanced science then possible and the
finest art then available with curiosity, beauty and rigorous and exotic portrayals
of the new lands outside Europe, could only be produced at that time in Portugal:
the country then offering the incredible and extraordinary circumstances of three
men surprisingly working together on a fascinating masterpiece: a black cartographer,
an Iberian nobleman and a Flemish painter - Pedro Reinel, Lopo Homem and Antonio
de Holanda. Extraordinary circumstances. An extraordinary work.
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Historic Maps of Maldives 
