Document 16-1: World Map (1502)

The World as Europeans Knew It in 1502

Created in 1502, this map shows the world as Europeans knew it ten years after the voyages of Christopher Columbus. The African coastline is rendered in extraordinarily accurate detail. Trading destinations in India and Southeast Asia are also clearly indicated. The Americas, however, remain a rough sketch, a largely imagined place, not a known one. Nonetheless, the map offers a glimpse of the future. In 1494, Spain and Portugal signed the Treaty of Tordesillas, which established a line of demarcation running north-south (the blue line on the left side of the map running through modern-day Brazil). All non-European territories to the west of the line were to be Spanish. All those to the east were to be Portuguese. As you examine the map, think about what it reveals about the European age of expansion. How does it tell the story of the previous century of exploration? What does it suggest about the course of conquests yet to come?

image
Universal History Archive/UIG/Bridgeman Images.

READING AND DISCUSSION QUESTIONS

  1. How would you explain the prominence of Africa on the map? How did Europeans develop such an accurate sense of its coastline?
  2. What were the larger implications of the Treaty of Tordesillas? What does it tell you about the importance the Spanish and Portuguese attached to the discoveries and achievements of the fifteenth century?