Table of Contents

Part 1 Christopher Columbus and his achievement. Part 2 The Earth as the protected centre of a finite universe and the Earth as the yolk in the cosmic egg: the spherical shape of the world; the cosmos as an egg; the structure of the universe from the four elements. Part 3 The shape of the Earth: Columbus and the spherical shape of the Earth; the learned clerical tradition; the astronomical handbooks of the High Middle Ages and the universities; circumnavigating the Earth; disc or sphere?; the background to the concept of the disc-shaped Earth. Part 4 The fascination of the world Down Under - the fourth continent and the Antipodes: the three continents and the medieval maps of the world; the fourth continent; Terra Australis Incognita and the Antipodes. Part 5 To the ends of the Earth: the far-off East; the hot South; the bleak North; excursus; hope in the East; the Indian kingdom of Prester John. Part 6 The journey to the centre of the Earth - Jerusalem as the hub of the world. Part 7 The fruits of original sin - monstrous races on the edges of the world known to man: the discoverers and the cannibals; Alexander and the wonders of the East; the Europeans and the monsters. Part 8 God's mysterious ways, or the hidden powers of nature - astro-meteorology in the Middle Ages: earth; water; air; fire. Part 9 A new continent, a new Earth, a new world - from Columbus to Galileo: geography; astronomy. Appendix: interpretation of a medieval world map based on the "Mappa Mundi" in Hereford Cathedral.

Reviews

This lively and informative study surveys the medieval view of the world before Columbus. MEDIUM AEVUM Extraordinarily useful.
*ARTHURIANA*