Urbano Monti (16 August 1544 – 15 May 1613), alternatively spelled Urbano Monte, was an Italian geographer and cartographer.

Life

He was born and raised in Milan, Italy, in a family of the minor nobility. He grew up together with his two younger brothers and his paternal cousins in the family house in Milan. Despite his noble status Monti never held public office, but instead occupied himself with scholarship, particularly

history History is the systematic study of the past, focusing primarily on the Human history, human past. As an academic discipline, it analyses and interprets evidence to construct narratives about what happened and explain why it happened. Some t ...

and

geography Geography (from Ancient Greek ; combining 'Earth' and 'write', literally 'Earth writing') is the study of the lands, features, inhabitants, and phenomena of Earth. Geography is an all-encompassing discipline that seeks an understanding o ...

, with administering the family property, and with philanthropic endeavors. At the age of 35 he married eighteen-year-old Margarita Niguarda by whom he had four sons and one daughter. He died in Milan on 15 May 1613 and was buried in the family chapel in the church of San Carlo al Corso.

Career

Monti's most famous work is a large-scale world map accompanied by a multi-volume treatise on geography and

cosmology Cosmology () is a branch of physics and metaphysics dealing with the nature of the universe, the cosmos. The term ''cosmology'' was first used in English in 1656 in Thomas Blount's ''Glossographia'', with the meaning of "a speaking of the wo ...

. The map reflects the geographical knowledge of his time, but in some ways it is surprisingly advanced. While drawing on the works of other early modern cartographers like

Gerardus Mercator Gerardus Mercator (; 5 March 1512 – 2 December 1594) was a Flemish people, Flemish geographer, cosmographer and Cartography, cartographer. He is most renowned for creating the Mercator 1569 world map, 1569 world map based on a new Mercator pr ...

and

Abraham Ortelius Abraham Ortelius (; also Ortels, Orthellius, Wortels; 4 or 14 April 152728 June 1598) was a cartographer, geographer, and cosmographer from Antwerp in the Spanish Netherlands. He is recognized as the creator of the list of atlases, first modern ...

, he included some of the most recent discoveries of his time, including the

archipelago An archipelago ( ), sometimes called an island group or island chain, is a chain, cluster, or collection of islands. An archipelago may be in an ocean, a sea, or a smaller body of water. Example archipelagos include the Aegean Islands (the o ...

Tierra del Fuego Tierra del Fuego (, ; Spanish for "Land of Fire", rarely also Fireland in English) is an archipelago off the southernmost tip of the South America, South American mainland, across the Strait of Magellan. The archipelago consists of the main is ...

. His depiction of

Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...

is particularly detailed and contains many place names not present on other Western maps of the time. One of the only three surviving copies of Monti's world map is today a part of the David Rumsey Historical Map Collection of

Stanford University Leland Stanford Junior University, commonly referred to as Stanford University, is a Private university, private research university in Stanford, California, United States. It was founded in 1885 by railroad magnate Leland Stanford (the eighth ...

and have been recently digitized.

Notable works

His notable books include: * ''Descrizione del mondo sin qui conosciuto'' * ''Un prezioso cimelio della cartografia italiana''

References

Sources

* * * * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Monti, Urbano 16th-century Italian cartographers 1544 births 1613 deaths Scientists from Milan 17th-century Italian cartographers Duchy of Milan people