Thevet's Grand Insulaire and his Travels in the Levant

Abstract

Two folio volumes in the Bibliothèque Nationale (MS. Fr. 15, 452–3) contain an ambitious work by André Thevet on the islands of the world, entitled Le Grand Insulaire et Pilotage d'Andre Thevet, Angoumousin, cosmographe du Roy, dans lequel sont contenus plusieurs plants d'isles habitées et déshiabitées et description d'icelles. The date 1586 is scribbled on the back of one of the maps in vol. i. and checked by a reference on f. 112, which gives the date of the Insulaire as twenty-five years later than a voyage undertaken by the author to the New World in 1551. We may thus take the date of the composition as lying between 1576 and 1586.The first volume of the Insulaire (numbered ff. 413, of which nineteen are blank, plus thirty-two unnumbered written sheets) contains descriptions and many engraved maps of the North European and East Indian Islands, Japan, the Canaries, and the islands of the New World.

The Croatian Islands on maps in André Thevet's Le Grand Insulaire et Pilotage

“…He described Croatia in Cosmographie de Levant, published in Lyon in 1554, and P. Matković (Matković, 1992: 76-77, note 2) noted this briefly. T. Valčić-Bulić (Valčić-Bulić, 2006;2007) Hasluck (1914) and in a catalogue of maps from a work edited by F. Lestringant (1984), a scholar who devoted most of his opus to Thevet's works (Lestringant 1991;1994;2003). It is important, however, when interpreting Thevet's maps of the Croatian islands, to take into consideration the general opinion of Thevet as a geographer and cartographer expressed not only by Lestringant, but by M. Destombes (1972), P. E. H. Hair (1982), G. Van Den Abbeele (1992), E. Dumotier-Sigwalt (2002), andG.…”

“…O Thevetovu Velikom izolaru i peljaru objavljeno je više knjiga i znanstvenih članaka, ali u njima nije analiziran geografski sadržaj koji se odnosi na Hrvatsku. Jedini spomen karata na kojima su prikazani hrvatski otoci nalazi se u članku o Thevetu Velikom izolaru i peljaru te njegovim putovanjima na Levant koji je priredio F. W. Hasluck (1914) te u katalogu karata iz Thevetova Velikoga izolara i peljara koji je priredio F. Lestringant (1984), znanstvenik koji je velik dio svojega opusa posvetio Thevetovim djelima (Lestringant, 1991;1994;2003). Važno je, međutim, za interpretaciju Thevetovih karata hrvatskih otoka uvažiti opće prosudbe o Thevetu kao geografu i kartografu koje su, uz F. Lestringanta, dali M. Destombes (1972), P. E. H. Hair (1982), G. Van Den Abbeele (1992), E. Dumotier-Sigwalt (2002) i G. Tolias (2012).…”

“…3). F. W. Hasluck (1914) was the first to draw attention to Thevet's maps of the Croatian islands in the British Museum. However, Hasluck wrongly claimed that the maps of Pag, Čiovo, and Korčula were not part of Thevet's manuscript, while he neglected to mention that the map of Hvar was also in the British Museum.…”

“…3). Na Thevetove karte hrvatskih otoka u British Museumu prvi je upozorio F. W. Hasluck (1914). Međutim, Hasluck je pogrešno naveo da se karte Paga, Čiova i Korčule ne nalaze u Thevetovu rukopisu, a k tomu nije naveo da se u British Museumu nalazila i karta Hvara.…”