The first printed map of Asia

Munster's important map of modern Asia, published in his ''Geographia universalis, vetus et nova, complectens Claudii Ptolemaei Alexandrini enarrationis libros VIII''. Much of the information for this map came from Portuguese sources, indicated by the presence of their Indian colonies Cambay, Goa, Calicut and Kannur. However further east Munster has had to return to Marco Polo's account, written in prison in 1298, for China and the 'Archipelago of 7448 Islands', the Philippines. Ptolemy's 'Taprobana' is now Sumatra rather than Sri Lanka. At the bottom of the map Zanzibar is an island south-east of Madagascar. Decorating the seas is a huge fish and a twin-tailed mermaid.