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Judging by appearances, we of the present day know much more on this subject than did the fellow-countrymen and contemporaries of Columbus. If the Genoese mariner had been informed of the existence of some rumours, he classed them with the information he had collected in the Cape de Verd Islands and with his classical recollections of the famous Island of Antilia and the Atlantides of Plato.
He may also have heard mention made of the islands situated in the Atlantic, and known by the names of Antilia, the Land of the Seven Cities, or Brazil. What seems more certain is, that his business affairs took him to the Levant, and, it is said, to Mecca, and that while there he would learn from what country came the spices, which then constituted the most important branch of Venetian commerce.
Brandon, or to look up Antilia, or the island of the Seven Cities.
After a stay of forty-seven days at this place in great friendship with the natives, we took our departure, and went to the island of Antilia , which was discovered a few years ago by Christopher Columbus, where we remained two months and two days repairing our vessels and procuring necessaries for the voyage home.
This old name afterwards gave the name by which the French still call the West Indies, Les Antilles. And from Antilia to Japan it will be two hundred and twenty-five leagues." Toscanelli says again, "You see that the voyage that you wish to attempt is much legs difficult than would be thought. You would be sure of this if you met as many people as I do who have been in the country of spices."
In the Catalan map of the world, which was the standard example of cosmography in the early days of Columbus, most of these mythical islands are marked. There was the island of Antilia, which was placed in 25 deg. 35' W., and was said to have been discovered by Don Roderick, the last of the Gothic kings of Spain, who fled there after his defeat by the Moors.
From the island of Antilia, which you call the Seven Cities, and of which you have some knowledge, there are ten spaces in the chart to the most noble island of Cipango, which make 2500 miles or 875 leagues . The island of Cipango abounds in gold, pearls and precious stones, and the people even cover their temples and palaces with plates of pure gold . But, for want of knowing the way, all these wonderful things remain hidden and concealed, although they might easily be gone to with safety.
There was the island of the Seven Cities, which is sometimes identified with this Antilia, and was the object of a persistent belief or superstition on the part of the inhabitants of the Canary Islands. They saw, or thought they saw, about ninety leagues to the westward, an island with high peaks and deep valleys.
Mangi or southern China. The island Antilia, the name of which has been since adopted by the French for the smaller West India islands, was, like the more modern Terra Australia incognita, a gratuitous supposition for preserving the balance of the earth, before the actual discovery of America. Cipango was the name by which Japan was then known in Europe, from the relations of Marco Polo.
In the Catalan map of the world, which was the standard example of cosmography in the early days of Columbus, most of these mythical islands are marked. There was the island of Antilia, which was placed in 25 deg. 35' W., and was said to have been discovered by Don Roderick, the last of the Gothic kings of Spain, who fled there after his defeat by the Moors.
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