Legendary Islands of the Atlantic: A Study of Medieval Geography

by William Henry Babcock

Antillia

The largest and most southerly, Antillia, the “opposite island,” which I take to be no other than Cuba, is shown as an elongated, very much conventionalized parallelogram, extending from the latitude of Morocco a little south of the Strait of Gibraltar to that of northern Portugal. As Humboldt says, it is about a third as wide as it is long; and in this respect it is singularly even throughout its length. In its eastern front there are four bays, and three in its western. The intervals on each side are pretty nearly equal, and each bay is of a three-lobed form resembling an ill-divided clover leaf. In the lower end there is a broader and larger bay nearly triangular. The artificial exactness of these minute details is in keeping with the treatment on divers maps of the really well-known islands of the eastern Atlantic archipelagoes, except that the comparative smallness of a Teneriffe, a Terceira, or even a Madeira, offered less opportunity. The slant of the island is very slightly east of north, obviously quite different from the actual longitudinal direction of the even more elongated Queen of the Antilles.

Reylla

Behind the lower part of Antillia, much as Jamaica is behind the eastern or lower part of Cuba, and about in similar proportions of relative area, Beccario shows a smaller but, nevertheless, considerable island, pentagonal in outline, mainly square in body, with a low westward-pointing broad-based triangular extension. He gives it the impressive name of Reylla, King Island, not ill suited to the royal beauty of that mountainous gem of the seas.

Salvagio

North of Antillia and nearly in line with it, but at a rather wide interval, he shows Saluagio or Salvagio (“u” and “v” being equivalent), which has the same name then long given to a wild and rocky cluster of islets between Madeira and the Canaries, that still bears it in the form Salvages. Wherever applied the name is bound to denote some form of savageness; perhaps “Savage Island” is an adequate rendering, the second word being understood. This Salvagio imitates the general form of Antillia on a reduced scale, being, nevertheless, much larger than any other island in the Atlantic south of the parallel of Ireland. Like Antillia, its eastern and western faces are provided with highly artificial bays, three in each. Its northern end is beveled upward and westward. I think this large island probably represents Florida, similarly situated to the northward of Cuba and divided from it by Florida Strait. Its area must have been nakedly conjectural, as much later maps show its line of supposed severance from the mainland to have been drawn by guesswork.

I in Mar

The inclined northern end of Salvagio is divided by a narrow sea belt from I in Mar, which has approximately a crescent form and a bulk not very different from that commonly ascribed at that time to Madeira. “I,” of course, stands for Insula or one of its derivatives, such as Illa, a word or initial applied or omitted at will. “Island in the Sea” is probably the true rendering, though formerly the initial and the two words were sometimes blended, as Tanmar or Danmar, to the confusion of geographers. A larger member of the Bahama group lying near the Florida coast would seem to fill the requirements, being naturally recognized as more at sea than Florida or Cuba. Great Abaco and Great Bahama are nearly contiguous and, considered together, would give nearly the required size and form; but it is not necessary to be individual in identification. Possibly Insula in Mar as drawn was meant to be symbolical and representative of the sea islands generally rather than to set forth any particular one of them.

The Roselli Map of 1468

The Roselli map of 1468,[257] the property of the Hispanic Society of America, New York City, is nearly as complete as the Beccario map of 1435. It lacks only the western part of Reylla (a name here corrupted into “roella”), by the reason of the limitations of the material. These maps were generally drawn on parchment made of lambskin with the narrow neck of the skin presented toward the west, perhaps as the quarter in which unavoidable omissions were thought to do the least harm. Because of the island’s position on the very edge of the skin, its outline, although unmistakable, is faint and in a few decades of exposure of the original might have vanished altogether. This raises the question whether certain outlines, now missing but plainly called for, on other maps of the same period, have not met with the same fate. Probably this has happened. Antilia—spelled thus—is plain in name and outline; so is the island next above it, spelled Saluaega. The “I” is omitted from I in Mar, as was often done in like cases, and the words “in Mar” are uncertain, but seem as above. The island figure is correctly given by Beccario’s standard, and in general the representation of the island series is almost exactly the same. Perhaps the most discernible difference is a very slight northwestern trend given to Antillia, instead of the equally slight northeastern inclination in Beccario’s case.