Islands of Demons
Somewhat allied by nature to these reported isles of destruction and disappearance are the islands of imported diabolism, appearing on maps now and then through the centuries. Bianco’s “The Hand of Satan” (1436[295]; [Fig. 25]), if correctly translated (see Ch. X, [p. 156]), is probably the first to present this quality. He locates the sinister island well to the southward; but the most pictorial appearance is Gastaldi’s (for Ramusio) “Island of Demons,”[296] with its eager and capering imps at the bleak and savage northern end of Newfoundland. The preferred site, however, would seem to be yet a little farther north. Ruysch, in the map referred to above, which announces the burning up of Gunnbjörn’s skerries, exhibits two Insulae Demonium near the middle of the dreaded Ginnungagap passage between Labrador and Greenland. There is no suggestion of volcanic action in their case, and it does not appear that any real islands occupied the spot. The reason for the delineation and the name is still to seek.
The map of 1544, attributed to Sebastian Cabot,[297] makes a single island of them, “marked Y. de Demones”, and brings it nearer the eastern front of Labrador below Hamilton Inlet. Agnese[298] in the same century enlarges it greatly but still keeps it just off the Labrador coast. The Ortelius map of 1570[299] ([Fig. 10]) shows the insular haunt of devils, plural again in form and name, but retains approximately the site chosen by Cabot. Mercator’s world map of 1569[300] keeps the islands plural beside the upper tip of Newfoundland, approximating Gastaldi’s position. There seems to have been a pronounced and general concurrence of belief in diabolical evil in the northeastern coast of America, perhaps because it is there that the Arctic current brings down its tremendous freight, and tempests are at their wildest, and all barrenness and bleakness at their worst.
Fig. 25—Section of the Bianco map of 1436 showing the Island of the Hand of Satan and Antillia. (After Kretschmer’s hand-copied reproduction.)