The Mysteries of the Marco Polo Maps

Benjamin B. Olshin

Oct 2014 · University of Chicago Press

About this ebook

This is the first credible book-length analysis of the maps once owned by the late Marcian Rossi, an Italian immigrant who believed the maps in his possession descended from the family of Marco Polo. In 1933, Rossi lent some of the maps to the Library of Congress for further study, at which time they caused quite a stir: leading to an examination by J. Edgar Hoover and the FBI, an article in the New York Times, and intensive but incomplete and unpublished reports conducted by the LOC. Rossi corresponded with the library until the 1950s, and even donated a map from his collection, known as the Map with Ship, to the Geography and Map Division (though hyperspectral imaging, X-ray fluorescence [XRF], and carbon dating later discredited any immediate relation of the map to Marco Polo). In 1948, Rossi contacted a respected historian of cartography, the late Leo Bagrow, who published the first scholarly journal article about the maps in "Imago Mundi."
The trail grows rather cold until 1999, when Olshin, intrigued by Bagrow s article since 1991, tracked down the great grandson of Marcian Rossi, Jeffrey Pendergraft, and embarked on a contemporary study of all the materials in Pendergraft s private collection, many of which Bagrow had not examined. He renewed contact with the Library of Congressas well as interest among map enthusiastsconsidering issues relevant to genealogy, cartography, and Italian and Chinese history, while reviewing a wealth of related letters and manuscripts in the possession of Pendergraft and the LOC. In 2007, Olshin published the first formal and comprehensive study of the Rossi collection since Bagrow s article a half century earlier, which appeared in "Terrae Incognitae," re-opening the maps to interrogation, speculation, and scrutiny.
This book explores the many possibilities surrounding the provenance of these maps and the questions they raise. Given what we do and do not know, and cannot possibly ascertain without paleographic evidence, he sets out to ask the right questions and find meaning in potential answers. Focusing on the content and context of the maps for more than a decade, the author has avoided the wild speculations of his predecessors and strikes a much-needed balance in the existing literature."

About the author

Benjamin B. Olshin is associate professor of philosophy and the history and philosophy of science and technology at the University of the Arts in Philadelphia. He lives in Philadelphia, PA.