ORIGIN OF NAME 165 fourteenth-century maps and records; but Corvo has always borne, in substance, the same name, one of the oldest on the Atlantic. Probably the very first instance of its use is in the Book of the Spanish Friar, 1 written about 1350 (the author says he was born in 1305), rather recently published in Spanish and since translated for the Hakluyt Society publications by Sir Clements Markham. After relating alleged visits to more accessible islands of the eastern Atlantic archipelagoes, from Lanzarote and Tene- rife of the Canaries to Sao Jorge (St. George) of the Azores, he continues: "another, Conejos [doubtless Li Conigi], another, Cuervo Marines [Corvo the sea crow island], so that altogether there are 25 islands." This account may not actually be later than the Atlante Mediceo map, 2 attributed to 1351 may even have been sug- gested by it, as some things seem to indicate. The Friar's voy- ages are perhaps merely imaginary, their variety and total extent being hardly believable. This very important map has been best reproduced in the collection by Theobald Fischer; on it the same name (Corvi Marinis) seems to be applied to both islands col- lectively, the plural form "insule" being used to introduce it. Both names appear on the Catalan map of I375. 3 It is more than probable that they date at least from the earlier half of the fourteenth century. Possibly the name Corvo had been carried over by a some- what free translation from the older Moorish seamen and cartographers, who dominated this part of the outer ocean from 1 Book of the Knowledge of All the Kingdoms, Lands, and Lordships That Are in the World, and the Arms and Devices of Each Land and Lordship, or of the Kings and Lords Who Possess Them, written by a Spanish Franciscan in the middle of the 1 4th century, published for the first tune with notes by Marcos Jimenez de la Espada in 1877, translated and edited by Sir Clements Markham, Hakluyt Soc. Publs., 2nd Sen, Vol. 29, London, 1912; reference on p. 29. 'Theobald Fischer: Sammlung mittelalterlicher Welt- und Seekarten italieni- schen Ursprungs, i vol. of text and 17 portfolios containing photographs of maps, Venice, 1877-86; reference in Portfolio 5 (Facsimile del Portolano Laurenziano- Gaddiano dell' anno 1351), PI. 4. 'A. E. Nordenskiold: Periplus: An Essay on the Early History of Charts and Sailing-Directions, transl. by F. A. Bather, Stockholm, 1897, PI. n. Our reproduc- tion (Fig. 5) does not extend far enough south to show the islands.
