The municipality of Cetraro could benefit in 2011 of the gift fund maps donated by Prof. Raphael Losardo engineer cetrarese ( Grisolia -CS- 1920 Naples 2011) and for years a university professor at the University of Naples Federico II Construction of roads, railways and airports. Lived in Naples , Vico Latilla 18 , he had already given the city a copy of the Cadastre of the eighteenth century and the collection of periodic cetrarese the early twentieth century ” Cetraro Nova” , with the aim of remembering the father figure Louis Losardo , that the foundation of that magazine had teamed together to Attilio and Francisco De Caro Aita . In the 60s Louis Losardo helps to deepen the knowledge of the Statutes of Cetraro , granted by the Abbot of Monte Cassino in 1512 for the good government of the city , taking care of the translation and dissemination .
The fund consists of a total of 78 maps of various formats for the period between the end of ‘400 and the post-unification period .
It fits in the tradition and in the application of geographical science , which represents the mapping with the territory and the phenomena that develop there , according to themes varied depending on the needs to be met .
The first cartographic representations were , in ancient times , especially the end of a route, or to score and represent paths , for economic or even military is also very significant tradition also on the cards Orbe known , maps , globes , and other or for the purposes of navigation, in this case, charts or pilot books , in order to indicate the route to the navigators and the various ports of call .
Topographic maps represent portions of territory , morphology, waterways and towns , whether they represent the coasts may take the name of hydrographic .
Since prehistoric times / proto- spread representations of larger or smaller portions of territory on various media , the tradition continued in ancient Greek times with the representation of the known world , trying to discern the shape of the earth and calculate its size .
From this point of view, astronomers , geographers, philosophers and mathematicians Greek wrestled in the search for scientific systems that make it possible to achieve accurate representations of the earth in which report data , news, and information collected from travelers and sailors. The various Anaximander , Hecataeus of Miletus , Dicearco from Messina, realized why various papers of the then known world , the most significant experiments were also those of Strabo , with its descriptive work , Geography, and especially Claudius Ptolemy ( 100-178 ) famous astronomer , mathematician and geographer .
In this context fits the tradition developed by the Romans , for strategic and practical needs of conquest, of itineraria picta , or routes which represented graphically the signs and those adnotata or scripta , or bearing texts in literary form the geographic descriptions .
Itineraria picta we have to report to the above Peutingeriana , medieval copy of the twelfth century. A.D. of a paper refers to the late third – early fourth century . AD, 12 sheets of parchment h 0,34 x0, 60 m (7.40 m in total of which received 6.80 ), which represents the entire Roman Empire with perspective deformed, flattened and dilated (ratio 21:1 between latitude and longitude ) , with paths , itinerarie , distances in miles, a complex symbolism and nomenclature to indicate cities, ports , stationes / mansiones / mutationes , over the hydrography .
The series of itineraria adnotata scripta or we have to report to the Itinerarium Antonini Augusti , the Itinerarium Burdigalense or Hierosolymitanum , Voyage of 334 AD of pilgrims who used the cursus publicus by Burdigala (Bordeaux ) up to the holy places in Palestine ( Jerusalem ), and also the Cosmography of Ravenna at (mid- seventh century. AD), the Liber Pontificalis Ecclesiae et Romanae Ravennatis (IX century . AD) the Cosmographia Guidonis ( 1119 AD).
During the Middle Ages , in addition, also the mapping , like other sciences , suffered the reflection of the decline of scientific research, the Ptolemaic geography was completely ignored and spread conceptions totally devoid of scientific basis to the point that Indicopleustes Cosmas , who was a navigator come to India and Ceylon , between 535 and 547 gave a representation of the universe like a tabernacle , with the rectangular ground , surrounded by oceans and topped to the north by a high mountain , at night , hiding the sun. At the time, it was also a widespread representation of the earth in T with the seas designed as large channels between Europe , Africa and Asia.
The situation changed after the thousand years , when , growing trade and navigation, you felt the need to create more practical use of cartographic documents correspond to reality .
But while in the Christian world to rationality and scientific research concepts prevailed imaginary influenced by religious beliefs , in the Islamic world there was a notable development studies . It is no coincidence then in the twelfth century it was an Arab, Abu Abdullah Ibn Mhammad , better known as al- Idrisi or Idrisi (1099 – 1165 approximately), to make a significant contribution to the development of cartography.
A man of great culture , in Palermo in 1138 was welcomed at the court of King Roger II, who gave him the mandate to draw up a work describing the known world on the basis of reliable data , collected during his travels , or with the ‘ help of other travelers and scholars . The work was completed in 1154 under the name of al- Mushtaq fi Nurhat ikhtraq al- afaq , also known as The Book of Roger , it is accompanied by Charta Rugeriana , a collection of 70 maps in paper setificata , considered the most important in ‘ scope of the geography of the Middle Ages.
With the discovery of the compass imposed a new kind of approach to cartographic representation : thanks to travelers Genoese and Venetians, who went so far in Asia and Africa, and the Spanish and Portuguese who explored the Americas and the distant lands of the Pacific, the cartographic documents were to represent larger and larger portions of the globe.
With Humanism and the rediscovery of classical culture , resources, interest in the texts of Ptolemy, which were repeat the cards , with the great geographical discoveries and the circumnavigation of the globe cartographic processing grew more and more and it became necessary to represent around the globe.
Among the first works published and disseminated the Geography of Ptolemy is asserted various cartographers , including Munster (1489 -1552) , Arquer (1523 – 1571) , Gerard Kremer , better known as Mercator (1512-1594) , considered the father cartography of the modern scientific because scientific methods applied to cartographic reproductions . The method, or Mercator projection , cylindrical projection is based on compliant and is still used in navigation rhumb . In 1605 he saw the light edition of the Mercator Atlas prepared by the Dutch cartographer Joost De Hondt , also known as Hondius ( 1563-1611 ), which reused the original copper plates and he published numerous subsequent editions. After his death, continued his work and the sons Jodocus Henry and his son Johannes Jansson , better known as Johannes Janssoni (1588 -1664) , publisher, engraver and cartographer .
At the time, even in Italian cartographers were numerous, in the XVI -XVII century worked in Genoa the illustrious family of cartographers of Maggiolo (or de Maiolo ) , who were custodians of the monopoly chart with the official appointment of the Republic. They also remind Porcacchi Tomaso (1530-1585) , a humanist who enjoyed great prestige as a geographer in Italy . It is also famous Giacomo Gastaldi (1500-1566) , considered the greatest Italian cartographer of the sixteenth century , well known abroad , the leader of a large group of cartographers, engravers , including Fabio Licinio (1520-1565) , a painter , who continued to operate in Venice with the etching technique in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries . Much more is known , however, the Flemish Abraham Ortelius (1527 – 1598) , better known as Ortelius , who was a cartographer , cosmografo and bibliophile , author of the Theatrum orbis terrarum , the first atlas of maps, with data derived from the knowledge and the results of latest explorations .
In the first half of the seventeenth century cartography underwent a period of significant expansion in Europe, especially for the spread of the works of descriptive character – mapping carried out under the patronage of the King He was also widely known Italian cartographer Giovanni Antonio Magini , who in 1596 published Geography of Ptolemy enriched with 37 new cards drawn by him . The Magini started the work for the construction of an atlas of Italy , consisting of updated cards on the basis of his studies and data provided by leading cartographers of the time, which had required the collaboration . The work was completed by his son Fabio in 1620 , three years after his death.
Magini can be linked to the Dutch cartographer Willem Janszoon Blaeu and French Melchior Tavernier (1564-1644) , a member of a family of cartographers who worked in France in the early decades of the seventeenth century. In the early seventeenth century date from the works of Philipp Cluver , or Philippus Cluverii Cluverius (1580-1623) , a German humanist and geographer who traveled in the Germanic countries , in France, in England and in Italy, especially for the study of antiquities. He gave a particular setting in the mapping , because in his works inserted historical themes and this is regarded as the founder of historical geography . In the seventeenth century worked in France Nicolas Sanson (1600-1667) , the great French cartographer in the same period in geographic scope , knowledge continued to grow and this science had considerable expansion : the new data that arrived in Europe with the succession of discoveries geographical , was added the development of scientific knowledge . The Netherlands, and Amsterdam, in particular, was then a center of world importance of cartography.
In Italy in the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries was of great importance to the work of Ravenna brother Vincenzo Coronelli (1650-1718) , a scholar of mathematics and geography , which was also great cartographer and cosmografo . Particular attention should be paid also the cartographer Francesco Cesare Cassini (1714-1784) , member of a large family of astronomers and geodetic of Italian origin. His grandson , Francis Caesar , he realized , between 1744 and 1815 , the topographic map of the Kingdom of France in 182 sheets in scale 1:86.400 .
In the eighteenth century , with the development of science and the creation of new and more sophisticated optical instruments , reputations new techniques that allowed more precise measurements and then the drawing of cards representing more precisely the territory. In that century the focus on cartography was remarkable : new projections were built and there were also searches for the identification systems to achieve a more accurate representation of the relief.
In the nineteenth century , finally , were born the great cartographic institutions that have begun to create cards using more advanced systems . Modern technology has greatly expanded the possibilities of cartography and after the Second World War onwards, especially with aerial surveys that allow you to accurately represent large parts of the territory and the birth of photogrammetry , mapping techniques have evolved tremendously .
The fund consists of Losardo important cartographic documents , maps as well as nautical , by Pirro Ligorio Prospero Parisi, Mercator, Ortelius .
It is worth mentioning cards made by Gerard Mercator and Abraham Ortelius , together with the founders and leading exponents of the Flemish cartography . The first is a map entitled Puglia flat , Terra di Bari , Terra di Otranto, et Basilicata Calabria composed in 1584 , while the second , also known as ” the painter of maps” , it preserves that title from Italy Nam Tellus Graecia Maior drawn around to half of the 500 . Both papers refer to an ancient representation of constituent territories today much of southern Italy.
We also play card Orbe Ptolemy as well as a series of cards with the representation of the kingdom of Naples, dated between 600 and 700 , the cards Rizzi Zannoni , cards Vaugondy Robert de (1750) , as well as geographers English , German, French .
A portion of the fund, with representation of the Kingdom of Naples , it is not recognizable , while another group of papers, dedicated to Calabria Citra and Ultra , it also presents its demographics , dating back to 800 as well as a map of the Province of Cosenza, published during the reign of Italy.