Why is there a Sea in America on Old Maps?

maps from the age of discovery are filled with some pretty interesting geography they had a mass that kept the world from tipping over the north pole had a giant magnetic rock in its center there was even land populated by giants but what i'm about to show you is one of my favorite examples of weird geography on old maps let's go to raremaps. com and click the north american category just two maps down we have a map that doesn't look quite right published in 1544 this map by sebastian munster is accurate enough that you can probably tell that this is north america there is modern day florida cuba and the gulf of mexico just to name a few recognizable places but there is a giant sea right in the middle of it i've covered an inland sea in north america on this channel before but this is something different this sea was discovered by italian explorer exploring on behalf of the french giovanni daverazano we'll begin this story of his discovery in september of 1522. the surviving members of ferdinand magellan's crew had just returned to spain having just circumnavigated the globe for france the competition in trade with spain as well as portugal was becoming more urgent french merchants and financiers urged king francis the first of france to send a voyage to find a quick passage to asia after the discovery of the americas every powerful country in europe wanted to find a faster route to asia through or around the continents in 1523 king francis the first asked verrazano to explore an area between florida and terra nova meaning newfoundland with the goal of finding a sea route to the pacific ocean a few months later verrazano and his four ships set sail due west for the grand banks of terra nova the course chosen in part to avoid the spanish and portuguese but a violent storm and rough seas caused the loss of two ships and damaged the remaining two they were forced to return to france repairs were completed in the final weeks of 1523 and the ships set sail again though under the control of rivals spain and portugal this time the ships headed south toward calmer waters one of the ships soon became damaged again leaving just one which continued on to north america verrazano and his crew reached the area of cape fear on march 21st and after a short stay continued northward and there it was what verrazano had come for in a letter to francis the first verrazano wrote we found there an isms one mile wide and about 200 miles long in which we could see the eastern sea from the ship halfway between west and north this is doubtless the one which goes around the tip of india china and cafe we sailed along this isthmus hoping all the time to find some straight or real promontory where the land might end to the north and we could reach those blessed shores of cathay unfortunately no one could sail right into this eastern sea but at least it would be a short portage but this was pure wishful thinking verrazano and his crew were actually off the coast of north carolina's outer banks what he saw was not an eastern sea but what we call today pamlico sound but verrazano continued his mission northward to look for another passage he was the first european to sail into new york bay today a statue sits in his honor in battery park in lower manhattan he discovered cape cod bay then followed the coast up to modern maine southeastern nova scotia and newfoundland he then returned to france on the 8th of july 1524 without finding a northwest passage but believing only a narrow ismus blocked their way verrazano named the region that he explored francesca in honor of the french king verrazano went on to have a couple more voyages one to south america and a third to florida and the caribbean verrazano perished on the third but there are conflicting accounts on how verrazano actually died in one version after he explored florida the bahamas and the lesser antilles verrazano anchored out to sea and rode ashore probably on the island of guadalupe he and the handful of his crew that went ashore thought the island was uninhabited but they were killed and eaten by the natives the other ships in the fleet were anchored out of gunshot range and so they were unable to intervene in time and instead were forced to watch them be chopped to pieces other accounts suggest that verrazano may have been executed by the spanish for piracy the sea of verrazano only survived on maps for a few decades but interesting theories on how asia could be reached through or around north america had just begun thank you raremaps.

com for sponsoring this video raremaps. com is an online antique map shop with over 10 000 antique maps in their inventory but their descriptions and high definition images are what makes many of these old map videos possible on their website they have maps showing the sea of verrazano like what was shown in the video as well as other fictional inland passages to the pacific ocean one of those i've already made a video on also possible because of them again that's raremaps.