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Date: | Wed, 13 May 1998 11:11:56 -0700 |
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Yes, but I understand that at least *some* of the accounts (the later
voyages?) attributed to Vespucci are highly questionable... Does Boorstin
cover this issue?
Mary Ellin
At 01:16 PM 5/13/98 Z, Richard Kimmel wrote:
>
>Mary Ellin-
>
> Welcome to Vespucciland (yes, I am old enough to remember
>Firesign Theater).
>
> Daniel J. Boorstin is my "authority" on just about everything
>world-historical. In The Discoverers (1983), Boorstin outlines
>Vespucci's voyages to the Americas and elsewhere, and notes that he
>traveled the southern part of the South American continent. Vespucci
>contributed to the solution of reckoning longitude, and the accounts
>of his voyages received much greater press than those of Columbus. As
>to the naming of the "Americas," Vespucci had nothing to do with
>that. Boorstin explains that an "obscure clergyman" named Martin
>Waldseemuller, while a member of a learned society in Northern France,
>had the South American continent inscribed "America" on a 1507 map
>published by the society. This map was widely distributed and
>reprinted, and by the time Waldseemuller discovered that he had
>attributed the discovery of the Americas to the wrong person, the name
>had taken hold.
>
> I hope this helps out. Check out Boorstin; he really is
>entertaining.
>
>Richard Kimmel
>
>
********************************
* Mary Ellin D'Agostino *
* [log in to unmask] *
* Department of Anthropology *
* University of California *
* Berkeley, CA 94720-3710 *
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