Antipodes: in Search of the Southern Continent Is a New History of an Ancient Geography
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ANTIPODES In Search of the Southern Continent AVAN JUDD STALLARD Antipodes: In Search of the Southern Continent is a new history of an ancient geography. It reassesses the evidence for why Europeans believed a massive southern continent existed, About the author and why they advocated for its Avan Judd Stallard is an discovery. When ships were equal historian, writer of fiction, and to ambitions, explorers set out to editor based in Wimbledon, find and claim Terra Australis— United Kingdom. As an said to be as large, rich and historian he is concerned with varied as all the northern lands both the messy detail of what combined. happened in the past and with Antipodes charts these how scholars “create” history. voyages—voyages both through Broad interests in philosophy, the imagination and across the psychology, biological sciences, high seas—in pursuit of the and philology are underpinned mythical Terra Australis. In doing by an abiding curiosity about so, the question is asked: how method and epistemology— could so many fail to see the how we get to knowledge and realities they encountered? And what we purport to do with how is it a mythical land held the it. Stallard sees great benefit gaze of an era famed for breaking in big picture history and the free the shackles of superstition? synthesis of existing corpuses of That Terra Australis did knowledge and is a proponent of not exist didn’t stop explorers greater consilience between the pursuing the continent to its sciences and humanities. Antarctic obsolescence, unwilling He lives with his wife, and to abandon the promise of such dog Javier. a rich and magnificent land till it was stripped of every ounce of value it had ever promised. In the process, the southern continent— an imaginary land—became one of the shaping forces of early modern history. ANTIPODES ANTIPODES In Search of the Southern Continent AVAN JUDD STALLARD Antipodes: In Search of the Southern Continent © Copyright 2016 Avan Judd Stallard All rights reserved. Apart from any uses permitted by Australia’s Copyright Act 1968, no part of this book may be reproduced by any process without prior written permission from the copyright owners. Inquiries should be directed to the publisher. Monash University Publishing Matheson Library and Information Services Building 40 Exhibition Walk Monash University Clayton, Victoria 3800, Australia www.publishing.monash.edu Monash University Publishing brings to the world publications which advance the best traditions of humane and enlightened thought. Monash University Publishing titles pass through a rigorous process of independent peer review. ISBN: 978-1-925377-32-3 (paperback) ISBN: 978-1-925377-33-0 (PDF) ISBN: 978-1-925377-34-7 (ePub) www.publishing.monash.edu.au/books/antipodes-9781925377323.html Series: History Commissioning Editor: Sean Scalmer Design: Les Thomas Cover image: Abraham Ortelius, Typus Orbis Terrarum, 1570. Courtesy of the National Library of Australia. National Library of Australia Cataloguing-in-Publication entry: Creator: Stallard, Avan Judd, author. Title: Antipodes : in search of the southern continent / Avan Judd Stallard. ISBN: 9781925377323 (paperback) Subjects: Geography, Ancient--History. Discoveries in geography--European--History. Explorers--19th century--History Australia--Discovery and exploration--History Dewey Number: 910.9 CONTENTS Copyright and Imprint Information . .iv List of Figures . .vi Acknowledgements . .ix Dedication . xi Preface: Imagining Geographies . xiii Introduction: What Exists Beyond . 1 Chapter One: The World as Palimpsest . 19 Chapter Two: The Cartographers’ Southern Continent . 47 Chapter Three: Terra Australis Takes Shape . 64 Chapter Four: Mercator’s Southern Continent and Theory of Equipoisure . 86 Chapter Five: Seeking Terra Australis . 112 Chapter Six: Dutch Discovery . 136 Chapter Seven: Van Diemen’s Lands . 149 Chapter Eight: Terra Australis Adrift . 169 Chapter Nine: An Icy End . 196 Chapter Ten: Mistaking Australia for Terra Australis . 228 Conclusion: The Power of Imaginative Geography . 237 Bibliography . 247 Index . 261 LIST OF FIGURES Figure A: Knowledge of the world per Hecataeus of Miletus, circa sixth century BC. .2 Figure B: The theory of zones. .4 Figure C: Crates’ cosmography. ................................. 7 Figure D: Reconstruction of Crates’ globe in Oliver J. Thomson, History of Ancient Geography. ..........................7 Figure E: Reconstruction of the diagram from the Mercator–Hondius Atlas juxtaposed with a re-drawing of the diagram. 99 Figure F: Melchior Tavernier, Charte Universelle de Tout le Monde, western hemisphere, detail, 1628. .....................175 Figure G: Giovanni Battista Nicolosi, world map, detail, 1660. .....178 Figure H: Philippe Buache, Carte des Terres Australes, detail, 1739. 203 About the Image Block Images Please note: due to copyright restrictions, the images in the image block are not able to be reproduced in the digital edition of this book. However, the majority of them may be found in the author's original thesis, available in PDF format from https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:243057/s4092025_phd_finalthesis.pdf Figure 1.1: Giovanni Schiaparelli, map of Mars, 1886. Figure 1.2: Representation of Ptolemy’s world geography in the Ulm edition of Geographia. Figure 1.3: Henricus Martellus, world map, circa 1489. Figure 1.4: Martin Waldseemüller, world map in 12 sheets, 1507. Figure 1.5: Cantino Planisphere, 1502. – vi – List of Figures Figure 2.1: Giovanni Contarini, world map, 1506. Figure 2.2: Ruysch map, 1507, from the 1507 edition of Ptolemy’s Geography. Figure 2.3: Lopo Homem, world map, 1519. Figure 2.4: Alessandro Zorzi sketch map, detail of Indian Ocean, circa 1508–1526. Figure 2.5: Alessandro Zorzi sketch map, detail of Africa, circa 1508–1526. Figure 2.6: Piri Reis, world map, fragment, 1513. Figure 2.7: Francesco Rosselli, world map, Greenwich version, 1508. Figure 2.8: Francesco Rosselli, world map, Florence version, 1508. Figure 2.9: Globe gores of the southern hemisphere based on Johannes Schöner’s globe of 1515. Figure 3.1: Franciscus Monachus, map of the world in De Orbis Situ, circa 1527. Figure 3.2: Oronce Finé, Nova, et Integra Universi Orbis Descriptio, 1531. Figure 3.3: Anonymous world map, circa 1530. Figure 3.4: Jean Rotz, world map, in the Boke of Idrography, 1542. Figure 3.5: Pierre Desceliers, world map, 1550. Figure 3.6: Pierre Desceliers, world map, detail, 1550. Figure 3.7: Giacomo Gastaldi, Universale, 1546. Figure 3.8: Gerard de Jode, Universalis Exactissima, 1555. Figure 3.9: Paolo Forlani, Universale Descrittione di Tutta la Terra Conosciuta Fin Oui, 1565. Figure 3.10: Paolo Forlani, world map, 1560, in Antoine Lafrery, Geografia Tavole Moderne di Geographia. Figure 4.1: Gerhard Mercator, Nova et Aucta Orbis Terrae Descriptio ad Usum Navigantium, 1569. Figure 4.2: Abraham Ortelius, Typus Orbis Terrarum, 1570. Figure 6.1: Hessel Gerritsz, map of the Pacific, 1622. – vii – ANTIPODES: IN SEARCH OF THE SOUTHERN CONTINENT Figure 6.2: Detail from a chart based on an original chart of Hessel Gerritsz produced around 1618, with additional discoveries. Figure 8.1: Jodocus Hondius senior, Orbis Terrae Novissima Descriptio, 1602. Figure 8.2: Jodocus Hondius junior, Nova Totius Terrarum Orbis Geographica ac Hydrographica Tabula, Amsterdam, 1625. Figure 8.3: Henricus Hondius, Polus Antarcticus, circa 1637. Figure 8.4: João Teixeira, Mapa Detodo el Mundo, from Teixeira’s atlas, Taboas Geraes de Toda a Navegaçaõ, 1630. Figure 8.5: Joseph Moxon, A Plat of all the World, 1655. Figure 8.6: Nicolas Sanson, Mappe-Monde, ou Carte Generale du Monde, 1651. Figure 8.7: Giovanni Battista Nicolosi, world map, 1660. Figure 8.8: Alain Mallet, Isles de Salomon, 1683. Figure 8.9: Melchisedech Thevenot, from his Relations de Divers Voyages Curieux, 1663. Figure 8.10: Emanuel Bowen, A Complete Map of the Southern Continent, in John Harris, Navigantium atque Itinerantium Bibliotheca, 1744. Figure 9.1: Jean-Claude Dezauche, Hémisphere Méridional pour Voir Plus Distinctement les Terres Australes, circa 1785. Figure 9.2: John Bowles, A Map of the World or Terrestrial Globe in Two Planispheres, 1740. Figure 9.3: Philippe Buache, Carte des Terres Australes, 1754. Figure 9.4: Philippe Buache, Carte du Globe Terrestre, 1746. Figure 9.5: William Whitchurch, Chart of Part of the South Sea, circa 1771–1779. – viii – ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The content of this book only started to take shape after receiving funding to spend six weeks at the National Library of Australia (NLA), possible due to the generosity of Mrs Pat McCann who funds the Normann McCann Summer Scholarships . Martin Woods and Damien Cole ran the map room at the NLA, where they proved fine hosts and wellsprings of information . Many of the maps contained in this book come courtesy of the NLA, an institution that admirably fulfils its charter as a repository of precious books, documents and artifacts . Indeed, this book would not be enriched with the evidence and the beauty of rare maps if not for the assistance of institutions and individuals around the world that provided high resolution images: I thank the British Library, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library (Yale University), Library of Congress, Biblioteca Estense (Modena), Bibliothèque Nationale de France, Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale di Firenze, National Maritime Museum (Green- wich), Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, John Carter Brown Library (Brown University), Universiteitsbibliotheek Utrecht, Mitchell Library, Princeton University Library,