Madeira, meaning island of the woods or forest island, is a direct Portuguese translation from the Italian “I. de Legname” of the Atlante Mediceo and various later maps, and of the “Lecname” of the unnamed Spanish friar who tells us he was born in 1305. It is sufficiently explained by the former condition of the island, the northern part of which is said to preserve still its abundant woodland. Perhaps the modern name of Madeira (or Madera) first appears on the map of Giraldi of 1426,[59] not very long after the rediscovery. But, with some cartographers, the Italian form of the name lingered on much later.
Fig. 3—Section of the Beccario map of 1426 showing St. Brendan’s Islands. (From a photograph in the author’s possession.)
The Beccario Map of 1426
The alternative names, which had been given the Madeira group by Dulcert and the Pizigani, commemorating both the general fact of repose or blessedness and the delighted visit of St. Brendan, were closely blended (in what became the accepted formula) by the 1426 map of Battista Beccario, which unluckily had never been published in reproduction. Before the war, however, the writer obtained a good photograph of a part of it from Munich and herewith presents a section recording the words “Insulle fortunate santi brandany” ([Fig. 3]).[60] The first “a” of the final name may possibly be an “e,” having been obscured by one of the compass lines; but I think not. Beccario repeats the same inscription in his very important and now well-known map[61] of 1435, substituting “sancti” for “santi” by way of correction.
With no serious variations, this name, “The Fortunate Islands of St. Brandan” (or Brendan), is applied to Madeira and her consorts by Pareto (1455;[62] [Fig. 21]), Benincasa (1482;[63] [Fig. 22]), the anonymous Weimar map formerly attributed to 1424 but probably of about 1480 or 1490,[64] and divers others. In several instances (the Beccario maps, for example) the words are almost as near to the most southerly pair of the Azores, next above them, as to the Madeiras below, and it is possible that the condition of special beatitude was understood as extending to the former also.
The Bianco Map of 1448
At any rate, the verdict of the fifteenth century for Madeira was by no means unanimous. The 1448 map of Bianco,[65] which is very unlike his earlier one of 1436 so far as concerns the Atlantic, was prepared after all the Azores had been found again by the Portuguese except Flores and Corvo. It shows the old familiar inaccurately north-and-south string of the three groups of the Azores as they had come to him conventionally and traditionally, for evidently he did not dare or could not bring himself to discard them. But it also shows a slanting array of islands farther out, arranged in two groups respectively of two islands and five islands each and much more accurately presented as to location and direction than the old Italian stand-bys. These are quite clearly the Portuguese version, brought down to that date, of the newly rediscovered Azorean archipelago. But Bianco was obviously put to it to conjecture what islands these might be. He drew names from miscellaneous sources: in particular the largest island of the main group, corresponding to Terceira, bears the title “ya fortunat de sa. beati blandan.” Nevertheless, he shows and names Madeira, Porto Santo, and Deserta in their usual places. Evidently he had given up, if he ever held, all thought of annexing St. Brendan’s special blessing to them. He seems very confident of the St. Brandan’s Island of his slanting series, for it is drawn heavily in black and contrasts with the rather ghastly aspect of some neighbors. It has nearly the form of a Maltese cross, with long arms, but there is no reason to suppose that this has any significance.
Behaim’s Globe of 1492
About the same period a Catalan map[66] of unknown authorship, without copying details, adopted the same expedient of duplicating the Azores by adding the new slanting series. It is quite independent in details, however, omitting mention of “St. Brandan” in particular, though Ateallo (Antillia?) is given in the second group but not in the corresponding place. This may possibly indicate some confusion of Antillia with St. Brandan’s Island, such as is more evident in the transfer of the traditional outline of the former to the latter, little changed, by Behaim on his globe of 1492.