1552 Aphricae Tabula III

This marvelous map of North Africa and Egypt is from Munster’s 1552 Latin edition of Ptolemy’s Geographia. The map is presented in a trapezoidal border, and the verso, featuring descriptive text in Latin, has an elaborate border of architectural details, ribbons, cherubs, and a vignette of a supine bishop. The entire region is rendered in exacting detail. While at times misinformed, in general the map provides accurate topographic detail of northern Africa, starting from the northwestern tip of Arabia and extending as west to what is now modern day Algeria. The cities of the ancient Greek Pentapolis are listed, with Cyrene represented as a rather prominent city, indicated by the miniature buildings depicting it. The space between Cyrenaica and Egypt is less well represented, but still features numerous place names, mountain ranges, and tribal regions. Two insets at the top and bottom left of the map provide Cyrenaic and Egyptian place names of unknown location. Munster’s depiction of E