Page 260 - Lanzarotto Malocello from Italy to the Canary Islands

260 from Italy to the Canary Islands

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covered “anew” in the 14 century. This author justifies his thesis with the
mythical memory of the lost “Fortunate Isles”, which should be identified
with the Azores and the Canary Islands. This thesis is certainly fascinating
(as it would give a logical solution to the myth of the Fortunate Isles or
Islands of the Blessed), but there is no evidence (such as Greek or Phoe-
nician relics on the islands) to substantiate this claim, so that we are still
merely in the field of hypotheses.
However, to conclude with the Atlantic myths, one cannot avoid speak-
ing of the myth of the “Pillars of Hercules”, and here it is worth mention-
ing the recent study by W. Randles, “L’Atlantico nella cartografia e nella
cultura europea del medioevo al rinascimento” [The Atlantic in European
cartography and culture from the Middle Ages to the Renaissance], pp.
427-438, in Los Fenicios y el Atlantico - IV coloquio the Centros de Estu-
dios y Punicos Phoenician, Madrid 2008, for the author points out that the
Pillars of Hercules have moved over the centuries; first, the Arab astrono-
th
mer Ali ibn Ridwan (11 century) placed them at Cadiz in 1272 and so did
the General Estoria of Alfonso X.
By 1430, the legendary Pillars had moved to Madeira; and in 1425,
Diego Gomez claimed they were south of Cape Nun (in modern Morocco).
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Soon after, in the mid 15 century, the Catalan map of the world kept in
the Estense Library in Modena set the Pillars in the island of Cape Verde,
as did Fra Mauro’s world map of 1459 at the National Library of St Mark’s
in Venice. Since in 1367 the nautical chart of the Pizigani brothers located
the Columns near the Azores, Randles concludes that, over the centuries,
the legendary Pillars of Hercules have kept moving farther west due to
the continuous geographic discoveries caused by increasingly long range
navigations.