Taking a closer look at Fra Mauro

I keep coming back to this one. The Fra Maura map is not just beautiful - it’s a compilation of the best geographical knowledge of the time. Unlike the religious propaganda in the preceding Mappa Mundi, the Fra Maura map is bursting with actual information.

Fra Maura copied nautical news from everybody - Ptolemy, Niccolò de' Conti, Marco Polo. Atlas Obscura has an old post https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/fra-mauro-map explaining how he basically ’crowdsourced’ his information.

But making sense of the map is not easy. It’s written in Latin and it’s upside down ( the south is at the top). So let’s turn it around….

There, a much more recognizable image for us, especially around the Mediterranean. But what about all those labels in Latin?

Well, there’s a website https://www.myoldmaps.com/late-medieval-maps-1300/249-fra-mauros-mappamundi/fra-mauro-transcriptions.pdf that not only gives you the English translation of every single word, it explains what the wording means. For example, one of Fra Maura’s notes on Saudi Arabia

-”Although in the nearby note I say that the spices travel as far as the Black Sea, today the roads are in such a poor state that they no longer reach that far “-

is given this context:

- Located in the Arabian peninsula, this note refers to the fact that the spice traffic from the East now preferred the sea route around Arabia to the traditional overland route.

The only problem is that I don’t have the map grid to locate each of the labels. So there’s no way to tell WHERE each explanation belongs.

Moving right along….

(Above) On the right, we have images from older Mappa Mundi - mythical people and the exact location of items like the Golden Fleece. But Fra Mauro (on the left) leaves out all that nonsense, and pictures only what he could reasonably confirm. One of his notes reads:

“not knowing of it anything to which I can bear witness, I leave the research to those who are curious to learn of such novelties”

(Above) AFRICA Fra Mauro was (one of?) the first to realize that ships could sail from the Atlantic Ocean to the Indian Ocean. He’s got Madagascar (#1) in the wrong place, and I’m assuming that the two large bodies of water (#2) are actually the Niger River and the Congo River. I remember driving across the Mississippi and wondering when the other side would show up. So I can imagine mistaking a river for a bay. He’s got the closer locations - Saudi Arabia and the Red Sea (#3) - positioned more accurately.

His notes say: this Cape of Diab (Mozambique) is separated from Abassia (Africa) by a channel that is lined on both sides by high mountains and trees that are so tall and thick they make the channel dark. The waters within it form a whirlpool so dangerous that any ship that encounters it is in peril

Explanation: note refers to the Channel of Mozambique and the dangerous Agulhas Current

(Above) ASIA Over here, #1 is India, #2 is Viet Nam, #4 is Korea, and #5 is the first time Japan appears on a western map. But the #3 (Below) needs further explanation:

(Above). Sorry, I’ve turned the world around again - south is at the top. Most ancient sources say that TAPROBANA is Ceylon, which is now Sri Lanka. But Fra Mauro realized that Taprobana is actually Sumatra. He labels Sri Lanka as Saylam.

INDIAN OCEAN Concerning the Indian Ocean, Fra Mauro writes: “Some authors write that the Sea of India is enclosed like a pond and does not communicate with the ocean. However, Solinus claims that it is itself part of the ocean and that it is navigable in the southern and south-western parts. And I myself say that some ships have sailed it along that route. This is confirmed by Pliny when he says that in his day two ships loaded with spices coming from the Sea of Arabia sailed around these regions to Spain and unloaded their cargo at Gibraltar”*

The explanation: In this important inscription Fra Mauro voices his belief that the Indian Ocean is not, as Ptolemy would have it, a sea enclosed by Africa*, the large southern regions usually referred to as terra incognita and the far limits of Asia and Cattigara. For him, it is open navigable water, and thus it is possible to circumnavigate Africa and pass from Saudi Arabia to Europe via the sea. It should be pointed out that, though this claim is made some decades before Vasco da Gama's circumnavigation of Africa,

*It seems to me that the explanation contradicts the translation…?

Let’s move on to the NILE:

Fra Mauro’s notes often read like an argument with the viewer. He seems to be saying “Look, I know famous cartographers like Ptolemy believe otherwise, but as far as I can tell, THIS is the reality” More of Fra Mauro’s notes:

I have often heard many say that here there is a column with a hand and inscription that informs one that one cannot go beyond this point. But here I would like the Portuguese that sail this sea to say if what I have heard is true, because I am not so bold as to affirm it

Some write that in these Indies there are many types of human and animal monster, but because few people believe these things, here I have made no note of them, except for certain animals, such as the serpents which are said to have seven heads. Again, here there are ants so very large that - something I will not dare to say - they seem to be dogs.

Explanation: Here is a perfect example of Fra Mauro's desire to offer a rational explanation of apparently unacceptable data in this note, where the account of the marvelous becomes critical evaluation and he argues that perhaps it is not the ants that are as big as dogs but…dogs.

Note that the Columns of Hercules refer to nothing but the division of mountains which once, according to the fable, closed the Strait of Gibraltar.

Explanation: The mythological account was that Hercules pried apart mounts Abila and Calpe and thus formed an opening between the Mediterranean with the Atlantic.

In this work I have of necessity decided to use the modern names because, to tell the truth, if I had done otherwise only a few learned men would have understood me. However, even they cannot always reconcile what the auctores say and what is current practice

Explanation: Here, Fra Mauro is justifying his choice of commonly used place names in preference to the Classical and Ptolemaic ones that have fallen into disuse.

Enough.

I am busy transferring my Mappa Mundi ( largely borrowed from Fra Mauro) unto a less busy background. You’ll see that next week. Stay safe.

Relics

Your mom’s old cookie jar. Your grandfather’s watch. Having something that belonged to someone we loved can be a comfort.

….then there are relics.

Wiki tells us that a religious relic is the physical remains (or personal effects) of a saint, preserved for veneration. Which sounds reasonable, until you see what sort of remains/effects they’re talking about. In the Catholic Church, relics include the heads, hands, blood, heart, tongue, jaw and other body parts of saints, most of whom died utterly grisly deaths. Somehow, someone saved some of the breast milk of the Virgin Mary. In addition to pieces of the cross Christ died on, there’s his crown of thorns, various cloths that wiped his face or that he was laid out on, and the actual lance that was used to pierce his side. Most incredibly, relics include Christ’s diapers and “the Holy Prepuce” - his foreskin.

The skull of St Catherine

The arm of St Francis

The jawbone of At Anthony

The footprint of Mohammed

The tooth of Buddha

I grew up with this nonsense, and only came to sanity gradually. Reading the Medieval Bodies book, and researching additional information and images, makes me fully realize the absolute lunacy of it all. How can anyone ever think that some stained piece of cloth holds even a drop of Mary’s breast milk? I want to scream “people can’t possibly be that stupid!” but, of course, current politics prove how wrong I am.

My sister Claire just reminded me about scapulars. We were supposed to wear them everyday:

A scapular consisted of two small pieces of cloth, with religious images/ text, joined by two ribbons. One square is on the chest the second square drops down the back. After my mother died, I created a reliquary, using her old bras, which each had a scapular pinned inside. The Middle Ages….right there in my mother’s underwear drawer:

Catholics weren’t the only lunatics. After Buddha was cremated, his ashes - and one or more teeth - were saved. Below is the architrave of the Siege of Kushinara, which was part of the war over the Buddha's Relics. Yes, a war over who gets to keep some ashes and an old tooth.

Islam has a rich history of the veneration of relics, especially of those attributed to the prophet Muhammad. However, these seem a bit more…normal? Hairs from his beard, a footprint, some clothes.

The Catholic Church has tried to move past past some of the more lurid relics. It’s lost, it was stolen, we don’t talk about that anymore. Yet when I was in Sicily at Easter one year, I saw people still lining up to kiss the feet of Christ’s statue. People still carried an effigy of his crucified body through the streets. I felt like an anthropologist coming home to study the culture she was raised in long ago. As Paul Simon sang “When I think back on all the crap I learned in high school It's a wonder I can think at all”

One more thing: my big one woman show opens in Tulsa soon. The 108 Contemporary Gallery has been doing everything humanly possible to make it a great exhibition……and I will be here in New Jersey, quarantining from Covid.

This too shall pass.

Stay well. Stay sane. See you next week.