"Spain Maps Her 'New World'"
 
by David Buisseret
 
in "Encounters" (February 1992, No. 8, pp. 14-19)
 
     Spanish colonial cartography is an enormous subject, for
which most of the sources have been lost.  There are, it is true,
a good many maps in the Archivo General de Indias in Seville, the
Biblioteca Nacional, the Museo Naval in Madrid, and the Archivo
General of Simancas.  But these are just the fragmentary remains
of what was once a much greater production.  many maps were
destroyed by fires, and others were stolen during periods of
civil disturbance, so we must always remember that we are dealing
with partial evidence.
     Even though the evidence is not as substantial as we would
like, the subject is nevertheless of great importance.  It is
hard to imagine the conquest and settlement of the New World
taking the shape that it did if there had been no maps to guide
its progress.  Moreover, the mapping of the new territories marks
an extraordinary episode in the history of cartography.  Among
the European powers, only Portugal was better equipped than Spain
to undertake such a task.  In Spain there was a long tradition of
chartmaking in the Mediterranean Sea (the portolan charts of
Majorca), and an equally long tradition of excellence in
mathematics and astronomy, largely the work of Muslims and of
Jews.  Putting these traditions together, the Spaniards were able
to compile maps of the world on a scale hitherto unimaginable.
     There were three main groups of people who produced maps at
this time: the royal cosmographers and pilots of the Casa de
Contratacion in Seville, the royal engineers, and the local
officials.  The royal cosmographers and pilots were chiefly
concerned with sea charts, but inevitably they also produced
delineations of parts of the New World.  From 1508 onward, the
Casa de Contratacion had a navigation school with pilots and
cosmographers who were responsible for the padron real, the
master map which contained the latest information about overseas
discoveries.  The royal engineers were assigned by the Spanish
kings to attend to fortifications and public works throughout the
empire.  Some of these engineers were trained overseas,
particularly in Italy, but others were products of the rich
tradition of map making which emerged in sixteenth-century Spain,
but was steadily lost in the course of the seventeenth century. 
In 1577 the local officials were invited to send back to Spain
with their relaciones geograficas a map of the region in
question.  Many of the local officials obeyed this request, using
whatever cartographic skills were available.  Some had
secretaries or military men who had had some training in Spain,
but many others had to rely on men who were skilled in the
cartographic style of Meso-America, a region with mapping
traditions which long antedated the arrival of the Spaniards.
     The royal cosmographers.  The navigation school in Seville
was set up with clear procedures and objectives.  All ships'
masters returning up the Guadalquivir River had to report to the
school in order to tell its pilots about any new lands which they
might have sighted or visited.  The pilots and cosmographers then
plotted this information, which was given in terms of latitude
and longitude, onto the master map.  Masters of ships leaving
Seville were also enjoined to call at the school in order to pick
up charts which had been copied for them from the master map.
     It is not clear how well this simple and elegant system
worked.  We do know that there were frequent quarrels among the
pilots and cosmographers, and that virtually none of the
specially drawn maps have survived.  But some copies were made of
the master map, and from these we can obtain a good idea of the
nature of the work of the school.  In theory such copies were not
meant to be made, but in practice some were drawn for various
European rulers, and it is in their archives that we now find
them, for no product of the school appears to survive in Spain
itself.
     For instance, in the Biblioteca Medicea-Laurenziana in
Florence we find the "Salviati Planisphere," which was probably
given by the Emperor Charles V to Cardinal Giovanni Salviati, the
papal nuncio, in 1526.  In the archive of the Marchesi
Castiglione in Mantua there is another world map of this kind,
given by the Emperor to Count Baldassare Castiglione at about the
same time.  There are four or five other examples of these world
maps in the archives of various German princes, and the most
impressive one of all is in the Vatican Library, having been
given to the Pope by the Emperor in 1529.
     Unfortunately, these manuscript maps are generally rather
hard to reproduce, except on a large scale.  But their most
important characteristics appear in a map published in Venice in
1534 and known as the "Ramusio map" because it appears in a
collection of travel accounts edited by the Italian of that name. 
This map, of which only two examples are known to survive in
Providence and Chicago, shows us the world as Seville
cosmographers saw it about 1530.
     In the Old World, Scotland is still little known.  In North
America, the east coast has now been quite well delineated, given
the great problem of determining longitude in the absence of
accurate time pieces.  The names of the various regions are
inserted on the mainland: "Labrador," "Bacalao" (codfish land),
"Gomez" (named after the Spanish explorer), "Ayllon" (also named
after a Spanish explorer), and "Florida."  In New Spain we can
see the city of "Temistitan" to the west of the Yucatan, which is
represented by an island.  The islands of the Caribbean Sea, well
known since the time of Columbus, are show with considerable
accuracy: Cuba, Jamaica, Hispaniola, Trinidad, and the Lesser
Antilles.  The cosmographers knew the general outline of Central
America and its west coast, calling this area and the region
north and south "Indie Occidentali," or "West Indies," for the
New World (or "Mondo Nuovo") was still confined to what we call
South America.  One of the most remarkable characteristics of
this school of cartographers was its moderation; where a
coastline was not known, they did not insert something, but left
the area blank.  This map is a remarkable testimony to the skill
of the Sevillian cartographers, who in the first third of the
sixteenth century had succeeded in setting out the main outlines
of the New World.
     The work of the school continued in the 1530s and 1540s,
with masters like Alonso de Santa Cruz, Sebastian Cabot, and
Pedro de Medina.  In 1562 Diego Gutierrez, pilot major and
cosmographer, published a magnificent "Americae ... Descriptio"
in Antwerp, which showed how cartographic knowledge had advanced
since the 1530s.  Gutierrez was obliged to have it engraved in
the Low Countries because no Spanish printer could undertake such
large and intricate work.  This map is now found only in Washing
and London and is the most detailed delineation of the New world
made until then.  The whole continent from "Gronlanda" to
"Patagones" is shown, with many names of rivers and of cities. 
The whole of the west coast is now known as far north as
California.  The map has certain weaknesses.  It does not show,
for instance, the discoveries of Jacques Cartier in the St.
Lawrence valley or those of Hernando de Soto in the valley of the
Mississippi River.  But in general, it gives us a good idea of
the work of the Seville school at the peak of its influence.
     In the latter part of the sixteenth century, one of the most
prominent Spanish cartographers was Juan Lopez de Velasco,
cosmographer major and chronicler of the Indies.  He composed a
very remarkable cartographic image of the Spanish Empire at this
time, consisting of a master map and twelve subsidiary maps and
portraying the worldwide Spanish Empire in cartographic form. 
One of the subsidiary maps concerns the audiencia of Hispaniola. 
It is not particularly original or very detailed, but it does set
out in systematic form the main features of this one audiencia. 
Using the whole set of maps drawn by Lopez de Velasco, a Spanish
administrator could obtain an accurate general view of all of
Spain's possessions.
     Such a general survey was far beyond the capacities of any
other European power during this period.  Better individual maps
were being drawn by Englishmen in Virginia and by Frenchmen in
Nova Scotia, but these showed relatively small areas.  What is
remarkable about the work of Lopez de Velasco is that it is truly
worldwide in scope, mapping all of Spain's possessions in turn
and relating them to the master map of the world as a whole.  It
is in a sense the swan song of the Sevillian cartographers, for
during the seventeenth century they would first be equalled and
then be surpassed by mapmakers in other parts of Europe.
     The Royal Engineers.  From the time of Charles V onward, the
Spanish crown employed large numbers of engineers to construct
and maintain fortifications all over the world.  The engineers
often made plans, which were sent back to Spain and survive in
considerable numbers not only in Seville but also at Simancas. 
On the whole, the plans of the first half of the sixteenth
century are relatively crude and lag behind the elegant work of
which the Italians and Germans were already capable.  By the end
of the century, however, engineers in the service of Philip II
were producing quite remarkable work.
     Some of the best plans were drawn by the Antonelli brothers. 
Juan Bautista Antonelli had come from Italy to serve Charles V
and worked on the peninsula until he died in 1588.  His younger
brother, Bautista Antonelli, also worked in Spain, but in 1581 he
went to the New World where he worked on various sites for about
thirty-five years.  One of the maps shows the plan of Cartagena
which he drew in 1595 when the city was being fortified against
attacks by Dutch, French, and English pirates.  The streets are
carefully laid out, as are the proposed bastions, and there is a
scale and orientation symbol.  Part of the existing city has been
left out of the proposed line of fortifications, and the
surrounding features like the bay and convent of Saint Francis
are carefully indicated.  Antonelli has signed his work at the
top right.
     As well as drawing plans of towns, Antonelli could also
compose maps of larger areas.  He produced a map of the road from
Veracruz to Mexico City, now preserved in the Archive of the
Indies in Seville.  The road, shown by a double line, begins at
the bottom of the map and then runs northward, passing many
churches, estates, and ingenyos, or sugar factories, all
carefully named.  Toward the top of the map, we reach the
"Bolcan" before arriving at Mexico City, whose system of dikes is
shown in bright blue.  Antonelli adds a scale and orientation and
also a commentary.  Using a map of this kind, the king could get
a good idea of the geographical features of this important
communications link.
     Another engineer prominent toward the end of the century was
Cristobal de Rojas.  He was a professor at Philip II's
Mathematics Academy, founded in Madrid in 1582, and the author of
a treatise on fortifications.  Before going to the New World, he
worked extensively in Spain, composing plans of which a good many
survive.  One of them show his version of the fortifications of
Cartagena in 1617, when much work had already been done.  Most of
the town is in strict plan, as if seen from above, but the
bastion at the lower right has been sketched in bird's-eye form
to five a fuller idea of its appearance.
     Later in the seventeenth century, the work of the royal
engineers tended to become less accurate and less elegant, until
the revival associated with the French influence at the end of
the century.  This provides an interesting sidelight on the
general decadence of the sciences in Spain at this period. 
Still, for almost one hundred years, the royal engineers produced
work of high quality, much of which survives.  These plans are a
rich source for historians, and especially to those interested in
the development of colonial cities.
     The Local Officials.  From 1569 onward, the Council of the
Indies had been asking local officials for geographical and
topographical information about their regions.  In 1577, the
letter requesting this information also asked them to "make a
colored plan of the streets, squares, and other places like
monasteries--a plan simply drawn on paper, showing the
orientation of the city."  Many maps and plans were drawn in
response to this appeal, and a good many of them survive.  They
are known as the pinturas which accompany the relaciones
geograficas.  Twelve are housed at the Real Academia de la
Historia in Madrid, twenty-seven the Archivo de las Indias in
Seville, and thirty-seven in the library of the University of
Texas at Austin.  In addition, there are probably others in the
very rich collections of the Archivo General de la Nacion in
Mexico City.
     These maps and plans are of particular interest because they
show us not only what level of skill existed within the ranks of
Spain's officials, but also the way in which indigenous and
European cartographic styles could be fused.  There existed in
Meso-America, especially in the former Aztec provinces, a rich
map-making tradition quite distinct from the European one, with
its own way of showing roads, rivers, woods, and mountains.  One
example is a "Plan of the Valley of the San Miguel River, from
its source to San Francisco de Chamacuero," drawn in 1580,
probably to accompany one of the relaciones geograficas.  It is
now in the Real Academia de la Historia in Madrid.  In this map,
the natural features like mountains and vegetation are shown in
the Aztec style, while the river, roads (in red), and buildings
are in the Spanish style.  In fact this is an image of conquest
and guerrilla warfare.  On the left, a Spanish column is
advancing with its ox carts along the main road.  Some of the
Spaniards are mounted and bear guns.  There are cattle on the
plain.  We see Indians in the mountains, no doubt waiting for an
opportunity to attack this column.  The aridity of the hills in
conveyed by the frequent sketches of cactus plants.  Another map
from the Real Academia de la Historia shows the town of Texupa in
southern Mexico.  The pintura is more frankly Indian in
inspiration.  The two hills at center and top left come out of
the American tradition, as do the roads with their hoof prints,
and the river with its fish.  European elements are more or less
confined to the town, with its rectangular street pattern and
Spanish-style church.
     Another town plan shows the pintura of Teozacoalco, studied
by Alfonso Caso.  This is a very stylized depiction of the area. 
The thirteen church symbols represent the parishes or haciendas
subject to the jurisdiction of Teozacoalco, and the roads lead to
the city where the words "these are the houses of Don Felipe and
Don Francisco his brother, natural lords of this pueblo" may be
read.  On the left there is a genealogical table of the type
commonly found on Aztec maps.  Unlike the European cartographers,
those of Meso-America tried to include information about both
space and time on the same document--a very interesting concept.
     The maps produced to accompany the relaciones geograficas
were by no means the end of cartographic production in Central
America.  On the contrary, an enormous quantity of maps continued
to be drawn in this region, and many are now preserved in Mexico
City at the Archivo General de la Nacion.  Our example shows part
of the road between Cuernavaca and Mexico City.  It was built for
the transport of sugar, and we see three carts which are
approaching the "coral" of Tututla on the royal road.  As always,
there are elements of the two traditions in the map, typical of
the wealth of the Archivo de la Nacion.
     Such then are the three main groups of mapmakers active in
the spanish empire of the sixteenth century.  Their work is of
extraordinary interest, not only for historians of geography who
find here remarkable examples of stylistic development and
cultural fusion, but also for historians of the empire in
general.  As is so often the case, a study of history of
cartography throws light on economic and social developments in
many different areas of human activity.
 
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