Mystery Associated With This Map
According to Carlos Sanz (Mapas antiguos del mundo, Madrid, 1961), if the east coast of North America is compared with modern-day maps, we will be struck by its immediately noticeable similarity with the coastline stretching from Florida to the Delaware or Hudson River. “This would appear to be impossible”, he adds, “when we consider the general belief that the Europeans neither saw nor set foot on the beaches in the southern states of the present-day U.S.A. before Ponce de León arrived there in 1512 or 1513, Giovanni da Verrazzano in 1523, Lucas Vásquez de Ayllón in 1520-1524 or Esteban Gómez in 1525. An explanation must be found”. Or, by Vasco Núñez de Balboa in 1513.
What appears to be the Gulf of Mexico can be seen on the map, at a time when, “officially” it had still not been discovered by the Spanish yet, though it is not certain this represents the Gulf. A half-dozen other explanations have been offered by historians of cartography. As there are 21 placenames written on the American coast, one possible explanation is that sailors had previously navigated these coasts. Based on this information, maps were created. This map presumably then obtained data from these unknown maps.
Read more about this topic: Caverio Map
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