to be made accessible in Latin, chiefly by fugitive Greeks from Constantinople, which had been taken by the Turks in 1453.  Ptolemy’s geography was printed at Rome in 1462, and with maps in 1478.  But even without the maps the calculation which he had made of the length of the known world tended to shorten the distance between Portugal and Farther India by 2500 miles.  Since his time the travels of Marco Polo had added to the knowledge of Europe the vast extent of Cathay and the distant islands of Zipangu (Japan), which would again reduce the distance by another 1500 miles.  As the Greek geographers had somewhat under-estimated the whole circuit of the globe, it would thus seem that Zipangu was not more than 4000 miles to the west of Portugal.  As the Azores were considered to be much farther off from the coast than they really were, it might easily seem, to an enthusiastic mind, that Farther India might be reached when 3000 miles of the ocean had been traversed.

[Illustration:  TOSCANELLI’S MAP (restored)]

This was the notion that seized the mind of Christopher Columbus, born at Genoa in 1446, of humble parentage, his father being a weaver.  He seems to have obtained sufficient knowledge to enable him to study the works of the learned, and of the ancients in Latin translations.  But in his early years he devoted his attention to obtaining a practical acquaintance with seamanship.  In his day, as we have seen, Portugal was the centre of geographical knowledge, and he and his brother Bartolomeo, after many voyages north and south, settled at last in Lisbon—­his brother as a map-maker, and himself as a practical seaman.  This was about the year 1473, and shortly afterwards he married Felipa Moniz, daughter of Bartolomeo Perestrello, an Italian in the service of the King of Portugal, and for some time Governor of Madeira.

Now it chanced just at this time that there was a rumour in Portugal that a certain Italian philosopher, named Toscanelli, had put forth views as to the possibility of a westward voyage to Cathay, or China, and the Portuguese king had, through a monk named Martinez, applied to Toscanelli to know his views, which were given in a letter dated 25th June 1474.  It would appear that, quite independently, Columbus had heard the rumour, and applied to Toscanelli, for in the latter’s reply he, like a good business man, shortened his answer by giving a copy of the letter he had recently written to Martinez.  What was more important and more useful, Toscanelli sent a map showing in hours (or degrees) the probable distance between Spain and Cathay westward.  By adding the information given by Marco Polo to the incorrect views of Ptolemy about the breadth of the inhabited world, Toscanelli reduced the distance from the Azores to 52 deg., or 3120 miles.  Columbus always expressed his indebtedness to Toscanelli’s map for his guidance, and, as we shall see, depended upon it very closely, both in steering, and in estimating the distance to be traversed.  Unfortunately this map has been lost, but from a list of geographical positions, with latitude and longitude, founded upon it, modern geographers have been able to restore it in some detail, and a simplified sketch of it may be here inserted, as perhaps the most important document in Columbus’s career.