The Ottoman Empire was even more powerful than it seemed. This is evidenced by the Piri Reis map, found in 1929 during work on the creation of a museum in the halls of the main palace of the rulers of Porte.
Until the middle of the 19th century, the palace itself was the largest residence of the sultans, in which monarchs lived and ruled. After the fall of the Ottoman Empire, the palace was turned into a museum, one of the largest in the world.
The most reliable map of the early 16th century
This guide was compiled in Constantinople. The last edits date back to 1513. The compiler was the Turkish admiral and cartographer Piri-reis. During his naval service, on which he spent most of his life from 17 to 84 years old, Piri Reis sailed the Indian Ocean, the Persian Gulf, participated in the battles of Malaga, Lepanto, Aden, took part in the capture of the islands of Kish, Rhodes, Qatar, Bahrain. Knowledge of the location of the islands, distant shores, allowed Piri-Reis to draw up the most detailed map of his time.
Bust of Piri Reis.
What is depicted on a piece of papyrus
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On the discovered fragment of the map, in its currently standard location with fairly accurate bends of the coastlines, one can see:
- southwestern Europe;
- west of Africa;
- Brazil;
- Caribbean, Azores, Canary and other islands;
- parts of Antarctica.
This fact is considered proof that the ships of the Ottoman Empire sailed much farther than other ships of that time. Although even the Falkland Islands in the South Atlantic were discovered at the end of the 16th century. The papyrus contains the exact outlines of the geographical features of South America, including the Andes, the discovery of which dates back several decades later.
The most controversial issue regarding the Piri Reis map is the land, which coincides in shape and location with the Antarctic coast. Although the first data about it were transmitted to the mainland by the members of the expedition of 1819-1821, which included Bellingshausen and Lazarev.
A piece of a map found during work in the Topkapi Palace in Istanbul.
There is not a single evidence of early studies of the southern lands, the results of which the Piri Turks could use.
Some researchers claim that the cartographer had different, earlier maps of local origin, which allowed him to map boundaries and create such accurate maps. Moreover, to determine the distances, a device like a spherical trigonometry apparatus was required, because even on ships of that time, navigation did not have the ability to determine longitude.
Detailed distance meters on the water appeared two centuries after the creation of the Piri Reis map. The cartographer himself pointed out in his works that the map is based on the mysterious guidebooks of Columbus. When this became known, the treasure hunters began searching for the lost map of the most famous navigator of the 15th century, but this was not crowned with success.
Research continues, but data on early sources has not yet been obtained, so Piri-reis remains the first cartographer to capture Antarctica.