1810 Gemelli / Humboldt Map of Aztec Migration from Aztlan to Chapultapec, Mexico

Aztec Exodus.

This is Alexander von Humboldt and Aimé Bonpland's 1810 depiction of the legendary Aztec migration from Aztlan to Chapultepec Hill, currently Mexico City. It appeared in their stunningly illustrated work Voyage aux régions équinoxiales du Nouveau Continent, which marked an important step in the development of knowledge about the flora, fauna, and cultures of the Americas.

A Closer Look

This work is based on a 1704 map drawn by Giovanni Francesco Gemelli Careri, the first published representation of the migration from Aztlan to Chapultepec, which was said to be based on an indigenous codex. Though hard to follow as a map, this work embraces cartographic, historical, and spiritual elements, tracing the mythological movement of the Aztecs from Aztlan, a mysterious paradise somewhere to the north of Mexico, possibly in the vicinity of the Great Salt Lake, Utah, to Chapultepec Hill, a strategic and spiritual site of the highest importance for the Aztecs. The various stations on the migration are numbered, with Aztlan appearing here on the left as a lake in which sits a mountain and a palm tree. The progression meanders along many paths and digressions to finally arrive at the right, where we see a hill upon which rests a gigantic Grasshopper - Chapultepec, which means 'Grasshopper Hill' in Nahuatl. There is no firm directional orientation, as the map was intended to be rotated and examined from different perspectives.

The Aztec Legend of Aztlan

According to legend, on exactly May 24, 1065 CE, spurred by some unknown apocalyptic event, the Mexica (Aztec) began an epic mass migration from their ancestral homeland, Aztlan, which translated means 'Place of Reeds' or 'Place of Egrets', to the shores of Lake Texcoco, in Mexico's Central Mesa. The actual location of Aztlan remains a mystery, but linguistic similarities and clues from surviving Aztec folklore suggest it lies somewhere in the vicinity of modern-day Utah or Nevada. Arriving at the Central Mesa, the pilgrims founded the city of Tenochtitlan, which, in time, spawned the mighty Aztec Empire, famously encountered by Hernan Cortes several hundred years later. The migration, which seems to have lasted some 250 years, is comparable in scope and later legendary significance to the Biblical wanderings of the Israelites recorded in Exodus.

Giovanni Francesco Gemelli Careri

Giovanni Francesco Gemelli Careri was a Neapolitan lawyer and adventurer who spent several years traveling the world in the 1690s. In Mexico, Gemelli was inspired by pre-Columbian culture and dedicated several chapters of his important book Giro Intorno al Mondo to discussing Aztec history and legends. This map, along with Gemelli's important representation of the Aztec Calendar, first appeared in the 1704 English edition of his work - presumably Gemelli chose not to publish all of his maps and drawings in the earlier Italian edition. Though Gemelli's work attained great fame in Europe, by the end of the 18th century, it was considered to be mostly fictional. It was Alexander von Humboldt who resuscitated Gemelli's reputation. In preparing his important 1811 map of New Spain, Humboldt found himself impressed with Gemelli's in-depth geographical knowledge of Mexico, which he understood could only have been obtained through actual experience.

Humboldt Takes a Crack at the Mystery

Most of the early stopping points identified here are difficult to correspond with actual localities, but the later part of the migration seems to be historically rooted, with sites like Chapultepec and Lake Texcoco clearly identifiable. Nonetheless, an attempt to reconcile the early points on the pilgrimage was made by no less than the renowned German naturalist and mapmaker Alexander von Humboldt, who was fascinated with indigenous cartographic knowledge and incorporated it into his many important maps. Humboldt no doubt had this very map before him (he references Gemelli) when he drew his seminal 1811 map of New Spain (offered by us, Mexique-humboldt-1811-2), on which many of the stops on the Aztec migration are noted.

Voyage aux régions équinoxiales du Nouveau Continent

Published between 1808 and 1834, Voyage aux régions équinoxiales du Nouveau Continent stands as one of the most ambitious scientific publications in history, chronicling the five-year expedition of Alexander von Humboldt and Aimé Bonpland through Central and South America. This massive 30-volume corpus was a watershed in both travel and scientific literature. While Bonpland's meticulous botanical work documented thousands of new plant species, Humboldt synthesized their findings into a holistic view that integrated ecology and geophysics. Their collaborative efforts utilized cutting-edge instrumentation to measure everything from magnetic intensity and atmospheric pressure to the chemical composition of the air, effectively laying the groundwork for modern physical geography and meteorology. Humboldt played a major role in shifting the prevailing understanding of nature as a static collection of objects to a living, changing, and interconnected set of systems. The work's vivid, visual representations using aquatint plates make it among the most beautiful scientific texts of the early 19th century.

Publication History and Census

This map originally appeared in 1704 in the English edition of Gemelli's A Voyage Round the World. Humboldt's edition of the map that appeared in Voyage aux régions équinoxiales du Nouveau Continent fait en 1799, 1800, 1801, 1802, 1803 et 1804 was not an exact copy, with numbers replacing labels on the map and the map being rotated and rearranged somewhat, but it is in essence the same. This work was printed by Langlois in Paris. It is only independently cataloged (and digitized) by the David Rumsey Historical Map Collection and the Wellcome Collection, while the entire Voyage aux régions équinoxiales du Nouveau Continent is more widely distributed in institutional collections.

Cartographers

Giovanni Francesco Gemelli Careri (1651-1725) was a seventeenth century Italian adventurer and traveler. Gemelli Careri was born in a middle class family in Taurianova, Italy, 1651, and died in Naples in 1725. He obtained a doctorate in law at the College of Jesuits in Naples. After completing his studies he briefly entered the judiciary. In 1685 he took time off to travel around Europe (France, Spain, Germany, and Hungary). In 1687 he returned to Naples and re-entered the judiciary. He also began work on his first two books: Relazione delle Campagne d'Ungheria (1689) with co-author Matteo Egizio, and "Viaggi in Europa" (1693). At this time Gemelli experience growing frustrations with the legal profession when he was denied certain opportunities because he did not have an established aristocratic origin. Eventually, he decided to suspend his career for a round-the-world trip. This five year journey would lead to his best known six-volume book, Giro Intorno al Mondo (1699). Gemelli financed his round-the-world venture via various minor merchant ventures, purchasing valuable goods at each strange of the trip. Starting in Egypt he traveled through the Middle East eventually making his way across Armenia and Persia to India and thence to China, where he was introduced to the Emperor. From China he hopped aboard a trading vessel on its way to the Philippines and, crossing the Pacific on a Spanish galleon, landed in Mexico. In Mexico, the Italian traveler became a celebrity by the simple expedient of telling his anecdotes over and over to the local aristocrats. His insatiable curiosity would take him beyond the capital, visiting several mining towns and the ancient ruins of Teotihuacan. Gemelli became fascinated with pre-Columbian culture and dedicated a considerable time and energy to researching studying in Mexico. On his return to Europe in 1699 Gemelli published Giro Intorno al Mondo. Though instantly popular, by the late 18th century his travels were lumped with Mandeville's and presumed to be fictional. Following in Gemelli's footsteps a century later Alexander von Humboldt found that the Italian's lawyer's description of Mexico was so accurate and detailed it could only have been obtained by first hand experience - thus vindicating Gemelli's writings. Gemelli was famously among the first Europeans to tour the world using public transportation; his travels, undertaken for pleasure rather than profit, may have inspired Jules Verne's Around the World in Eighty Days   Further Details...

Alexander von Humboldt (September 14, 1769 - May 6, 1859), whose full birth name is Friedrich Wilhelm Heinrich Alexander Freiherr von Humboldt was a German born naturalist, biologist, geologist, explorer and cartographer active in the late 18th and first half of the 19th century. The importance and scope of Humboldt's work is staggering and its influence on both the development of America and the development of science itself is second to none. As Emil Du Bois-Reymond said, "Every scientist is a descendant of Humboldt. We are all his family." To compose a full biography of Humboldt is the work of volumes, not this simple medium, so we will attempt to focus on the highlights of Humboldt's life as it pertains to cartography. Humboldt was the first scientist to embrace and actually take into the field the Kantian concept of a union between careful scientific observation and intuitive analysis. Between 1799 and 1804 Humboldt traveled through northwestern South America, Central America, Mexico, and parts of the United States. During this voyage he collected a wealth scientific observations and measurements, including considerable surveying and cartographic work, in each of the regions through which he passed. Humboldt's mapping of Mexico, then inclusive of much of the southwestern part of the United States, was an accomplishment of seminal importance, not only because it was the finest map of the region yet produced, but also because of its impact on the future political geography of the Americas. Upon his arrival in Washington, Humboldt struck up a friendship with president Thomas Jefferson, soon to be president James Madison, and other luminaries of post Colonial America. He freely shared his mappings of Mexico with the U.S. President, little suspecting that they would soon influence the results of the Mexican American War and the manifest destiny movement that would follow. When he returned to Germany, Humboldt began a life-long correspondence with scientific luminaries and explorers throughout the world and most particularly in America. Humboldt's influence can be directly tagged to the development of numerous important careers in American cartography, including those of Nicolette, Fremont, Wilkes, Hassler, Bache, and others. Though Humboldt never again visited America, his name is etched across our landscape through numerous Mountains, Rivers, Islands, and other geological features that bear his name. Had the votes in Congress swayed slightly to the other direction, even the entire state of Nevada would have been the state of Humboldt. Throughout his life, Humboldt was a tireless supporter of human equality, scientific advancement, and personal liberty. Humboldt died in Berlin at 89 years old, in his long life he was an inspiration to the invention of modern anthropology, the political destiny of South America, the geographical exploration of the American West, and, ultimately, the development of modern science.   Further Details...

Hyacinthe Langlois (fl. c. 1800 - 1852) was a Parisian publishing house specializing in maps, atlases, and travel literature. They do not appear to have any relation with Eustache-Hyacinthe Langlois, a contemporary artist and engraver, who spent most of his adult life in Rouen.   Further Details...

Source

Humboldt, A. von and Bonpland, A., Voyage aux régions équinoxiales du Nouveau Continent fait en 1799, 1800, 1801, 1802, 1803 et 1804, (Paris: F. Schoell) 1810.    

Condition

Very good.

References

Rumsey 10555.035.