Columbus & the Age of Explorers

This portfolio is part of the Library of Congress' First American Encounters Collection, and several L.O.C. resources were supplied to make this kit. Geographer Louis De Vorsey, Jr. sheds new light on Columbus the entrepreneur, the native peoples he and others encountered, and prior European explorations of the North American continent. Students are provided with a revealing perspective on the explorers’ contacts, encounters, and relationships with the natives. Students will study both history and geography using the many maps and other hands-on documents, and gain a fresh view of the age of exploration. This portfolio includes a Study Guide with reproducible student activities. 4 Illustrated Broadsheet Essays: * Columbus’s World and Enterprise * Contacts, Encounters, Relationships * Encounters Before Columbus * Naming America 14 Primary Source Documents: * Illustration from Topographia Christiana by Cosmas of Alexandria, a sixth-century convert to the early Christian Church * Portrait of Christopher Columbus by Laurens Lotto in 1512 * Martin Behaim’s globe gores: sheets designed to paste onto a spherical shape to make the globe * The first engraving of Martin Behaim’s world map, 1730 * Map of the inhabited world or "Oecumene" of Claudius Ptolemy, 1482 * World map engraved for Giuseppe Rosaccio, 1610 * Engravings, Theodor de Bry from Americae pars quarta * Map of America engraved Cornelius de Jode in 1593 * Suma de Geografia, Martin Fernandez de Encisco, 1519 * Map of the Aztec capital Tenochtitlan, 1521 * Reproduction of the controversial Yale Vinland Map, considered by some "the oldest known map showing American lands," and by others, a fairly recent forgery * Page from 13th c. manuscript Icelandic Saga * Champlain’s chart of the Gulf of Maine, in full-color, prepared for presentation to King Henry IV * Reproduction of Martin Waldseemuller’s map, 1507