Mayda and the Isle of Man
We have, then, in this fourteenth-century island a direct recorded association with the Arabs, followed long after by what have been thought to be Arabic names. We have also a pictorial and cartographical connection with Brittany and also an indication of relations with Ireland. This last is fortified by its next and, except Mayda, its most lasting name.
The great Catalan map of 1375[144] ([Fig. 5]) calls it Mam, which should doubtless be read as Man, for it was common to treat “m” and “n” as interchangeable, no less than “u” and “v” or “i” and “y.” Thus Pareto’s map of 1455[145] ([Fig. 21]) turns the Latin “hanc” into “hamc” and “Aragon” into “Aragom.” On some of the early maps, e. g. that of Juan da Napoli (fifteenth century),[146] the proper spelling “Man” is retained, just as it is retained and has been ever since early Celtic days, in the name of the home of “the little Manx nation” in the Irish Sea. That the same name should be carried farther afield and applied to a remote island of the Atlantic Ocean is quite in accordance with the natural course of things and the general experience of mankind. No doubt the name Man might be derived from other sources, but the chances are in this instance that the Irish people whose navigators found Brazil Island (or imagined it, if you please) did the same favor for the crescent-shaped “Man,” quite overriding for a hundred years any preceding or competing titles.
Almost immediately there was some competition, for the Pinelli map of 1384[147] calls it Jonzele (possibly to be read I Onzele, a word which has an Italian look but is of no certain derivation), reducing the delineation of the island to a mere shred, bringing Brazil close to it, and giving the pair a more northern and more inshore location. Another map of about the same period follows this lead, but there the divergence ended. Soleri of 1385[148] reverted to the former representation; and about the opening of the fifteenth century the regular showing of the pair was established—Brazil and Man, circle and crescent, by those names and in approximately the locations and relative position first stated.
It is true that the crescent island is sometimes represented without any name, as though it were well enough known to make a name unnecessary. But during the fifteenth century, when it is called anything, with a bare exception or two, it is called Man. Its shape and general location are substantially those of the Catalan map of 1375 on the maps of Juan da Napoli; Giraldi, 1426;[149] Beccario, 1426[150] and 1435[151] ([Fig. 20]); Bianco, 1436 and 1448;[152] Benincasa, 1467[153] and 1482[154] ([Fig. 22]); Roselli, 1468;[155] the Weimar map, (probably) about 1481;[156] Freducci, 1497;[157] and others—arguing surely a robust and confident tradition.