PART II: South America on ancient, medieval and Renaissance maps

TABLE OF CONTENTS

The South American river system on the London Martellus map (1489)

The distortion grid method

Latitudes and longitudes on the 1489 Martellus map

Creation of the grid

Analysis of the grid

The large coastal bend between Peru and Chile, depicted by Martellus (1489) and Waldseemüller (1507)

Andreas Walsperger's world map (1448)

Walsperger and Columbus

Columbus and the pear-shaped Earth

Al-Khwarizmi

Ptolemy and the Great Gulf

Marinus of Tyre and the reconstruction of his map

The riddle of Cattigara

Exploration of South America in ancient times

The Chinese theory

The Chinese in America

Chinese stone anchors in Palos Verdes (California)

Chinese ships

Yü Chi Fu's map

Gavin Menzies and Chinese sailors

Fu-Sang: the Chinese in America before Columbus

The Pacific basin: 4,000 years of cultural relations. Indisputable Chinese presence in pre-Columbian America

Asian leukaemia in pre-Columbian Chilean mummies

Indisputable evidence of contact between ancient China and Peru

Quipu knotted strings

The Egyptian theory

Egyptian inscriptions in America

Torquetum and calculation of the longitude in ancient times

The Phoenician theory

The mystery of the Dragon's Tail

By way of conclusion

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS