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Pompofianus to be put to death for having a terreftrial globe painted in his room, as ifhe afpired to fupreme power. With refpeCt to the antiquity of geographical charts,Fabricius * and Hauber f may be confulted. More than one interpreter of the Scrip-tures pretend that geographical charts are alluded to in the Book of Jofhua, chap. 18 th.In Egypt , Sefoftris, whom Father Tourmenine imagines to be the Pharaoh of Scripture,directed geographical charts to be conftruCted j. Ariftagoras, tyrant of Miletus ,fhewed to Cleomenes, King of Macedonia , a table of brafs, on which was reprefented thepofition of all the lands, feas, and towns from Sparta to Suza, the capital of Perfia §.This verfe alfo of Propertius is well known :
Depi&ed worlds l ftrive from charts to know ||.
As well as the chart of Peutinger, of the time of Diocletian , (and not of TheodofiusJ,which my deceafed friend, M. Scheyb, publifhed at Vienna in 1753. Agathodemon,the mechanic of Alexandria, who lived in the fifth century, was the firlt who conftruCtedcharts for the geography of Ptolomey . Thefe are the twenty-feven charts yet inexiftence, but which affuredly had undergone confiderable changes previous to theirbeing rendered into Latin , in 1471, by Nicholas Donis, a Benedictine of Reichenback ;before which time the names were written in Greek characters. In 1762, I faw, in thepolfeffion of Mr. Reimarus, at Hamburgh, the fragment of a chart of Italy, (Ptolomey ,tab. viii.) with the names in Greek, made in the eleventh century. In 1478, a copy ofthis chart was taken at Rome , on brafs or pewter, the names of the places on whichwere engraven with the punch. In 1482, Leonard Hal caufed this chart to be carvedon wood, together with five other charts of modern geography, planned by NicolasDonis., Twenty-three charts of this collection at Ulm, which were reprinted in i486,are to be found given upon vellum, and illuminated in the Latin manufcript of Ptolomey ,written in 1502, which belongs to the library of the town of Nuremberg . In the libraryof Ebner there is a beautiful manufcript of Ptolemey , confuting of one hundred andthree large fheets in folio, with the twenty-feven charts of Nicolas Donis, in gumpainting. How ridiculous the opinion of the firfl Chriftians of Alexandria refpeCtingthe form of the earth, may be gathered from the reprefentation given of it in theChriftian Topography, which fome writers afcribe to Rofmas Indopleufte Charle-magne was accuftomed to dine from a filver table, on which a map of the world wasengraven ; fo, at leaft, we are told by Eginhard .
In a volume which contains a collection of the Voyages of Marco Polo, Saint Bran-dan, Mandeville, Ulric de Friuli, and Johan Schildperger, and which is ftill in thelibrary of the city of Nuremberg **, the ancient owner of this book, Matthew Bratzl,receiver-general of the domains of the EleCtor of Bavaria , among other notes infertedby him in the year 1488, placed the following: “ I have collected and joined togetherthe above-mentioned book, on account of a very beautiful and valuable map of theworld,“which I have caufed to be planned with greateft care, in order that it may be offervice to thofe who fhall read the narratives of thefe travellers, and inftruCt them re-fpeCting countries hitherto unknown ; teach them the manners and cuftoms of the in-habitants ; and enable them, where the text may be infufficient for this purpofe, to dif-cover the proper road, &c. I moreover requefl and will, that fuch of my heirs as may
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Page iv. edit. Reimarius. t Biblioth. Antiq. p. 195. J Euftathius ad Dionyf. Parieg-
Herodotus, lib. iv. chap. 49. || Cogor et c tabula pidtos edifcere mundos.—Lib. iv. cleg. iii. v. 35 '
Fabricius, Bibl. Gr. lib. iii. p. 613- ** Catal. Bibl. Solg. i. No. 34.
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