Földvári Books

Early MS Copy of Breve Compendio / Arte de Navegar

Cortés, Martin

[Breve compendio de la sphera y de la arte de navegar] Tratado de la Esfera, Arte de Navegar y otras curiosidades correspondientes que escribió Martín Cortés, Año de 1545.

[Spain]: [around 1630]. Illustrated with tables and charts. Manuscript on paper. Written in ink by a neat hand. In contemporary vellum, title inked on spine. ff. 88 [3]. With a few contemporary notes and corrections. Later collection stamp on the first page. A brown stain to the upper corner, affecting the second half of the book. Occasional foxing. The text block is loose, almost detached from the binding. Otherwise in very good condition.

A manuscript copy of Martín Cortés’ Breve compendio de la sphera y de la arte de navegar (1551), with significant early Americana relevance, a treatise which revolutionized the science of navigation.

Breve compendio provides some of the earliest reliable information on the navigation of American waters, detailing discoveries in regions such as Peru, the Straits of Magellan, Brazil, Rio de la Plata, the Canary Islands, and the Indies.

Written by Martín Cortés (1510–1582), one of the most renowned cosmographers of the golden age of Spanish exploration. Cortés was born in Bujaraloz, Zaragoza, Aragon, and raised by a family of sailors and navigators. This upbringing likely contributed to his interest and success in his career. Starting in 1530, he taught cosmography and navigation to pilots in Cádiz and worked alongside the Spanish Navy, sharing his knowledge with ship captains.

The book, considered the first scientific navigation treatise of its time, is a practical guide comprising three main parts: cosmography in relation to navigation, the movements of the Sun and Moon, and the construction and use of navigation instruments.

Cortés’ understanding of the magnetic pole led to the development of the theory of magnetic meridians, significantly influencing the creation of geographical charts. His work was crucial for explorers to determine their location when out of sight of land, revolutionizing navigation science by first identifying the needle's deflection and influencing map-making practices.

Originally published in Seville in 1551, with a second edition in 1556, this treatise is exceedingly rare in all early editions and conditions, as it was even at the time when our manuscript was copied.

Because of the losses of the master copy, whose pages were unstitched, three pages of the preliminary texts (Carta; Prologo) were left blank, with the hope that the lost lines would eventually be recovered. The text is otherwise identical (except for spelling) to the original version, claims the copyist in his prologue on the first page of the manuscript. The missing texts are the title page of “Carta” and the first ten lines of its verso (fo. ii.); the last 11 lines of the title page of “Prologo” (fo. vi. verso), fo. vii, and the first two and a half lines on fo. vii. verso. Due to the locations of the missing lines, we surmise that the manuscript was not copied from a printed version but rather from another handwritten copy. For some reason, the last few lines of the second chapter of the third part are omitted (fo. lxviii.; MS f. 65.), but otherwise, we couldn’t find any major deviations from the original text.

The manuscript comprises the copyist’s prologue “Tratado de la Esfera […]”, the “Carta”, the “Prologo”, the three chapters of the treatise, an index (“Los nombres de los autores […]”), and the table of contents (“Tabla de los Capitulos”, which is located after the prologue in the printed version). The other index of subjects (“Tabla de la presente obra […]”) is also omitted from our copy. The manuscript is illustrated with tables and charts; however, the diagrams and maps are not included, only their places in the text are indicated in most cases. A few corrections and marginal notes are added to the text, seemingly by the copyist’s hand. The one on f. 35v contains references to the years 1630 and 1631, which, besides the calligraphy, helped to date our copy.

We could not trace any other manuscript copies, underscoring the rarity and unique historical value of this document.

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Price: €8,000.00