Map of a city identified as Temixtitan [actually Tenochtitlán, present-day Mexico City]. Built environment includes a sacrificial temple [the Templo Mayor], causeways, buildings, dwelling and gardens of Montezema [Moctezuma]. A map of the Gulf of Mexico is given. Also includes flag with Hapsburg double-headed eagle, scale, boats or canoes, and outlying settlements.
Source creator:
Cortés, Hernán, 1485-1547
Source Title:
[Cartas. Carta 2a] Praeclara Ferdina[n]di. Cortesii de noua maris oceani Hyspania narratio sacratissimo. ac inuictissimo Carolo Romanoru[m] Imperatori semper Augusto, Hyspaniaru[m], [etc] Regi Anno Domini. M.D.XX. transmitta ...
Source place of publication:
Impressa in celebri ciuitate Norimberga [Nuremberg]
Source publisher:
Per Fridericum Peypus
Source date:
M.D.XXIIII [1524]
notes:
This map is the first printed map to portray the outline of the Caribbean basin (and the first to mention Florida); it is also the first printed depiction of an American city. This woodcut has been attributed to Albrecht Dürer; it shows the city before its destruction by the Spanish in 1521 and includes the principal temples of the Aztecs, the main square (or Zócalo), the causeways which connected the city with the mainland, and the wicker dam which regulated the water of the Lake of Mexico.See also another version of the same map published in the same year in Venice (0236-2).
