OLAUS MAGNUS CARTA MARINA from 1539

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aukepalmhof
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OLAUS MAGNUS CARTA MARINA from 1539

Post by aukepalmhof » Tue Apr 02, 2019 7:31 pm

The ships depicted on the map are from around that time frame. In general, the ships depicted on the map are very well done, with the northern ships portrayed in their clinker-built style, indicating awareness of matters relating to ships and the sea.

Old Maps of the North and the Faroe Islands

Maps relate to a part of the Earth's surface, they representations of space in two dimensions. One way to study maps is to look at them as cultural historical sources to our past. Historical maps tell us how the North, the North Atlantic and the Faroe Islands have been represented throughout western history.

At the beginning of the 16th century, the Northern countries were an unknown region. The information about the North was based on the descriptions written in Antiquity and in medieval times. The cartographic representation of the North was, however, quite faulty and far from reality. The North was imagined both as a place of darkness, death and the seat of evil from European antiquity to the time of the nineteenth century, but also as a place of felicity with virtuous happy people. Pytheas of Massilia (350-285 BC) wrote about the people of the North and the people of Ultima Thule as the ‘Hyppoder’ (or, as they are called in other texts, the Hyperboreans). A standard reference in most maps is Ptolemy's Geography (Ptolemy or Claudius Ptolemaeus c. 100c.-170 BC). It is the only book on cartography to have survived from the classical period. Written in the second century AD. For more than fifteen centuries, it was the most detailed reference on how to draw maps.

For a long stretch in history, we will find the imaginary country of Thule. The concept of Thule or Ultima Thule is as famous as the myths of Avalon, Atlantis and El Dorado, it has lived on in the imagination of Europeans and we find it in old maps next to the Faroe Islands. Pytheas of Massalia was one of the first to go looking for Ultima Thule, in the third century BC.

Maps did not become well known in many areas of the world until the European Renaissance. Maps have been made by governments and their concerns with the national unity and even sometimes dreams of empires. It is easy to see that older maps can constitute a specialized graphic language and an instrument of communication that we might have forgotten.

In this series of stamps, POSTA wants to commemorate historical maps of the Faroe Islands.

Olaus Magnus' Carta marina from 1539
The year 1539 is an important one in the cartographic history of Scandinavia and the Faroe Islands. Olaus Magnus (1490-1557), a Swedish ecclesiastic, published his large map (125x170 cm) of the Northern Countries, Carta marina. Magnus was appointed archbishop in Uppsala by the Pope in 1544. His activities in the political life of the Reformation made him spend most of his life abroad, where he also wrote his works.

The Carta marina is regarded as one of the most beautiful maps filled with colourful illustrations, where the ocean is provided with number of whales, monsters and ships, where we on inlands find pictures from national life and nature. There are all types of people as well as many place names and historical references in the drawings. A closer look at the map reveals people, moose, birds, and even sea serpents gorging passing ships in the Sea of Scotland.

Magnus' version of the Faroe Islands contains seven islands. In his 1555 Historia de gentibus septentrionalibus (History of the Scandinavian People), he wrote about the dangerous rock formation in the southern part of the Faroe Islands called Munkurin (the Monk), which is also to be found on the map. Magnus saw the Faroe Islands as ‘ön Färö’ (that is, as a singular island named Faroe), which together with Munkurin constituted both a haven for sailors and a deadly place. He also mentioned the many dangerous monsters (whales and sea monsters) and demons. The killing of fish or whales (whales were fish at the time) is also depicted. The Faroes were even then, relatively well known among scholars and cartographers throughout Europe. Magnus’ map is evidence of a pre-Enlightenment image of the Faroes.

Kim Simonsen Ph.d. https://en.stamps.fo/ShopItem/2019/0/PPS000219/BLOKKUR

Faroe Islands 2019 three stamps and a miniature sheet 55Kr.
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2019 olaus magnus carta marina 1539.png

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aukepalmhof
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Re: OLAUS MAGNUS CARTA MARINA from 1539

Post by aukepalmhof » Fri Jun 21, 2019 10:01 pm

On 9 October 1989 Iceland issued a Miniature Sheet to raise money for the 1991 Nordia Stamp Exhibition

The Miniature Sheet shows part of a map published in Venice by the Swedish cartographer Olaus Magnus and dated 1539. The map has the title” Chart and Description of Northern Routes and Wonders to be found there prepared with the Utmost Diligence”.

16 Century sailing vessels can be seen on this map in battle with whales and other sea monsters. The coast of Iceland can be seen in the upper left corner of the MS. Two sailing ships can be seen, one of which, according to Magnus, comes from Scotland and the other from Hamburg, further east a whale attacks a sailing ship, and the crew throws wooden boxes overboard to chase away the beast.

The middle stamp shows an English ship that dropped its anchor on a whale as they believed it was an island. They left their ship and made a campfire after which their island suddenly was diving.

On the other stamp, on the right, a ship is attacked by a sea serpent.
In the far right-hand corner, a Danish merchant ship is beaten to pieces by a whale.
Iceland 1989 130Kr sgMS 736, scott?
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Image (17).jpg

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