The Qazaq steppe of the middle of the 16th century in the projection of the newly discovered original map of Antonio Jenkinson

• Main Authors: Kukashev , Rashid Sh., Кукашев , Рашид Ш.
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: Russian
• Published: Limited Liability Partnership «Institute for Humanities Studies ABDI» 2023
• Subjects: Anthony Jenkinson; Abraham Ortelius; Sigismund Herberstein; Matvey Mekhovsky; Muscovy; Tartaria; Litvania; Samoyeda; Nagaia; Cassackia; Антонио Дженкинсон; Абрахам Ортелий; Сигизмунд Герберштейн; Матвей Меховский; Московия; Тартария; Литвания; Самоеда; Нагая; Кассакия; samoyed*
• Online Access: https://qhr.kz/index.php/qhr/article/view/5; https://doi.org/10.69567/3007-0236.2023.1.140.187

The article is devoted to the study of a genuine copy of the map of Russia and Tartaria by Antonio Jenkinson of 1562, discovered by a Polish researcher from Wroclaw Krystyna Szykula in the late 1980s. The announcement of the original map aroused great interest in the academic world of cartography historians and representatives of other related disciplines, because for almost more than four centuries this important historical document testifying to the results of the activities of the first English travelers who opened the way to China and India through the expanses of Muscovy and Tartary was considered irretrievably lost and was known only in its main copy derivatives from the Cosmography of Abraham Ortelius and Gerard de Yoda. As it turned out, both copies are only a pale and emasculated reflection of their prototype. The “Wroclaw Find” presented us with a completely new image of the map associated with the name of Antonio Jenkinson, which has allowed us to significantly deepen and expand our knowledge about the history of geographical discoveries in Eurasia, relations between Western Europe and Russia, Russia’s relations with its western and eastern neighbors, as well as about history and ethnography of some regions of the East. At the same time, it should be noted that the newly acquired original map of Jenkinson - a good third of the displayed cartographic space of which is occupied by the territory of modern Qazaqstan - is still little known in our country. The purpose of our publication is to fill the gap by providing researchers with a fairly complete coverage of this most valuable historical and geographical source. The acquaintance with it may be useful and entertaining also for any Qazaqstani reader, since the map is a kind of a message from the middle of the 16th century, “written” in the most perceptible figurative language, i.e. the language of lines, colors, drawings, icons and brief explanatory texts. This message shows the world as it was seen by the majority of medieval Europeans, and moreover, ...