La grande isle de Java ("the great island of Java") was, according to Marco Polo, the largest island in the world; his Java Minor was the actual island of Sumatra, which takes its name from the city of Samudera (now Lhokseumawe) situated on its northern coast.Marco Polo, Milione: il Milione nelle redazioni toscana e franco-italiana, Le Divisament dou Monde, Gabriella Ponchi (ed.), Milano, Arnoldo Mondadori Editore, 1982, p.540, Cap.clxiii, "La grant isle de Java"
Earliest account Due to a scribal error in Book III of Marco Polo's travels treating of the route southward from Champa, where the name Java was substituted for Champa as the point of departure, Java Minor was located 1,300 miles to the south of Java Major, instead of from Champa, on or near an extension of the Terra Australis.(Paul Pelliot, Notes on Marco Polo, Paris, Imprimerie Nationale, 1963, Vol.II, p.769; James R. McClymont, "The Theory of an Antipodal Southern Continent during the Sixteenth Century", Report of the Fourth Meeting of the Australasian Association for the Advancement of Science, Hobart, January 1892, Hobart, the Association, 1893, pp.442-462.)
As explained by Sir Henry Yule, the editor of an English edition of Marco Polo's travels: "Some geographers of the 16th century, following the old editions which carried the travellers south-east of Java to the land of Boeach (or Locac), introduced in their maps a continent in that situation".(Sir Henry Yule (ed.), The Book of Ser Marco Polo, London, Murray, 1921, Vol.II, pp.276-280)
Jean Alfonse's cosmography
Java Minor was identified as an island (the present Island of Java) by the Franco-Portuguese navigator and cosmographer Jean Alfonse in his work of 1544, La Cosmographie but Java Major according to him was part of the continent of Terra Australis, which extended as far as the Antarctic Pole and the Strait of Magellan. In La Cosmographie, Alfonse defined La Grande Jave as an extension of the giant Antarctic continent, or Terra Australis: "This Java touches the Strait of Magellan in the west, and in the east Terra Australis ... I estimate that the coast of the Ocean Sea called the Austral coast extends eastwards to Java, to the western coast of the said Java.""Cest Jave tient en occident au destroict de Magaillan, et en orient à la terre Australle ... J'estime que cest coste de la mer Occéane qu'est dicte coste Australle se va rendre en Oriant, à la Jave, du cousté d'occident de ladicte Jave". Georges Musset (ed.), Recueil de Voyages et de Documents pour servir à l'Histoire de la Géographie, XX, La Cosmographie, Paris, 1904, f.150v, p399. and f.159r, p.427. See also the entry on Alfonse in Dictionnaire de Biographie française, Paris, 1933, p. 1491. Apparently in deference to Marco Polo's claim that Java Major was the largest island in the world, Alfonse gave the name Jave Mynore to the island of Java and the name La Grand Jave to the continental land to the south. Marco Polo's Java Minor, he called Samatrez (Sumatra). In La Cosmographie (1544), Alfonse said: La Grand Jave is a land that goes as far as under the Antarctic Pole and from the Terre Australle in the west to the land of the Strait of Magellan on the eastern side. Some say that it is islands but from what I have seen of it, it is terre ferme [a continent] ... That called Jave Mynore is an island, but la Grand Jave is terre ferme."Cest Jave est un terre qui va jusques dessoubz le polle antarctique et en occident tient à la terre Australle, et du cousté d'oriant à la terre du destroict de Magaillant. Aulcuns dient que ce sont isles. Et quant est de ce que j'en ay veu, c’est terre firme ... Celle que l'on appelle Jave Mynore est une isle. Mais la Grand Jave est terre ferme'. Jean Alfonse, La Cosmographie, 1544, f.147r, in Georges Musset (ed.), Recueil de Voyages et de Documents pour servir à l'Histoire de la Géographie, XX, Paris, 1904, p. 388-389; also quoted in Pierre Margry, Les Navigations Françaises et la Révolution Maritime du XIVe au XVIe Siécle, Paris, Librairie Tross, 1867, pp. 316-317; cited in James R. McClymont, "A Preliminary Critique of the Terra Australis Legend", Papers and Proceedings of the Royal Society of Tasmania for 1889, Hobart, 1890, pp. 43-52, n.b. p. 50; and idem, Essays on Historical Geography, London, Quaritch, 1921, pp. 16-18.
Later cartography This cosmographical concept was exhibited in the mid-sixteenth century mappemondes of the School of mapmakers centred at Dieppe, Normandy, which in later times gave rise to the idea that Australia may have been discovered by Europeans long before the Dutch began to chart its coast in 1606 or before James Cook charted its east coast in 1770. This is seen clearly in Jean Rotz's Lande of Java of 1542, the Dauphin Map or Harleian World Map of c. 1547,Dauphin Map [Harley World Map], France; 1547 and in Pierre Desceliers' mappemonde of 1546.Desceliers' 1546 mappemonde is held at the John Rylands Library, University of Manchester, and may be viewed at: rylibweb.man.ac.uk/specialcollections/guide/atoz/frenchms Alfonse's map of La Grande Jave bears a striking resemblance to that of Rotz.
Vincenzo Coronelli, on his Terrestrial Globe made in Venice in 1688, referred to the uncertainty regarding the location of Marco Polo's Java Minor, noting that while in the opinion of some it could be identified with Sumatra, others believed it to be Sumbawa or New Holland. His inscription reads: "Various are the opinions of the Geographers concerning the location of Giava minore, some placing it under the Tropic of Capricorn, in accordance with what Marco Polo wrote in bk.3, cap.13. Others believe it to be Sumatra from the distance which the same Polo assigned to it, others take it for the Island of Sumbawa, and some others, more modern, for New Holland. We, from so much variety of opinion, do not offer a final conclusion on the matter, leaving the dispute undecided.""Della Giava Minore. Varie sono appresso li Geografi l'opinioni del sito della Giava minore, collocando la alcuni sotto il Tropico di Capricorno secondo quello, che Marco Polo Patrizio Veneto scrive nel lib. 3 cap 13. altri credendola la Sumatra per le distanza, che n'assegna il medisimo Polo, altri volendola per l'Isola Çumbava, e qualch'altra de piu Moderni per la Nuova Hollanda. Noi tra le tante varietà le pareri non terminando cos' alcuna, lasciano la contesa indecisa".
In accordance with the uncorrected editions of Marco Polo's travels, on his 1688 Terrestrial Globe Coronelli inscribed over the northern part of Nuova Hollandia: "Some believe that in this place M. Polo discovered the Land of Lochac, and that 500 miles further on is found the Island of Pentan, and the Kingdom of Malaiur.""Credono alcuni scoperti in questo luogo da M. Polo il Paese di Lochac, e ch’avanzandosi 500. Miglia, trovasse l'Is. Pentã, et il Regno di Malaiur, dei quali non havendo sene contezza maggiore, oltre le relationi del med°. l. 2. C. 8. e. 9. raccolte da Ramusio nel 2. Vol." As a result of this mis-placement southwards of the lands and islands described by Marco Polo, Coronelli and others confused Java Minor, Polo's name for Sumatra, with New Holland (Australia). This confusion was greater on the earlier Dieppe maps of the 1540s where Java Minor and Java Major (Jave la Grande) were transposed, apparently in accordance with Marco Polo's statement that Java Major was "the greatest island in the world". In the Dieppe maps, Jave la Grande was made a part of the Antarctic continent, Terra Australis.Robert J. King, "The Jagiellonian Globe, Utopia and Jave la Grande", Globe Studies, No. 55/56 (2009, for 2007/2008), pp. 39-52.
Marco Polo's placenames Lochac (or Locach) was Marco Polo's rendition of the Chinese (Cantonese) Lo-huk, which was how they referred to the southern Thai kingdom of Lavapura, or Louvo (from Sanskrit Lavo, the present Lopburi "city of Lavo", after Lavo, in Hindu mythology the son of Rama: Lavo in Thai is spelled Lab, pronounced Lop'h; hence the name Lop'haburī, or Lop'ha-purī ลพบุรี (Lopburi)). Louvo was united with Siam in 1350.G. E. Gerini, Researches on Ptolemy's geography of Eastern Asia (further India and Indo-Malay archipelago), London, Royal Asiatic Society, Asiatic Society Monographs vol.1, 1909, p.180. Lopburi was a province of the Khmer Empire in Marco Polo's time, and he may have used "Locach" to refer to Cambodia.William Marsden, The Travels of Marco Polo, London, 1818, p. 362. The golden spires of Angkor, the capital of the Khmer empire, would have been a more likely inspiration of Marco's comment on the gold of Locach than the Lopburi of his time.
As Zhou Daguan, the ambassador sent by the Yuan court to Cambodia in 1296 commented: "These [golden towers] are the monuments that have caused merchants from overseas to speak so often of 'Zhenla [Cambodia] the rich and noble.Chou Ta-kuan 周達観 (Zhou Daguan, fl.1297), Customs of Cambodia 風土記, transl. Paul Pelliot and J. Gilman d'Arcy Paul, Bangkok, Siam Society, 1993, p. 2. The imprisonment by the Khmer ruler Jayavarman VIII of a Mongol emissary in 1281Chou Ta-kuan 周達観 (Zhou Daguan, fl.1297), Customs of Cambodia 風土記, transl. Paul Pelliot and J. Gilman d’Arcy Paul, Bangkok, Siam Society, 1993, pp.xviii-xix. "These [golden towers] are the monuments that have caused merchants from overseas to speak so often of 'Cambodia the rich and noble; ibid., p. 2. would have been ample justification for Marco's remark on the inhumanity of its people: he said that Locach "was such a savage place that few people ever go there", and that "the king himself does not want anyone to go there or to spy out his treasure or the state of his realm". Marco also noted the abundance of elephants in Locach; Locach was notable in the Chinese annals for sending elephants as tribute.Paul Pelliot, Notes on Marco Polo, Paris, Imprimerie Nationale, 1963, Vol.II, p.554, note 2. Paul Wheatley, "Lochac Revisited", Oriens Extremus, vol.16, 1969, pp.85-110.
Beach, as a mistranscription of Locach, originated with the 1532 editions of the Novus Orbis Regionum by Simon Grynaeus and Johann Huttich, in which Marco Polo's Locach was changed to Boëach, which was later shortened to Beach.Simon Grynaeus and Johann Huttich, Novus Orbis Regionum, Basel and Paris, 1532, Marco Polo cap.xi, "De provincia Boëach"; cited in Thomas Suarez, Early Mapping of Southeast Asia, Hong Kong, Periplus, 1999, p.160. Pentan is the island of Bintan, and Malaiur was the old Tamil name for the Sumatran city of Jambi (and is the origin of the national name Malay).Sir Henry Yule (ed.), The Book of Ser Marco Polo, London, Murray, 1921, Vol.II, pp.280-283
Jave la Grande as a composite of Regio Patalis and Brasielie Regio Robert J. King has suggested that Alfonse's description of La Grande Jave could also fit the Regio Patalis promontory on Oronce Fine's world map, and indicates that the Dieppe Maps appear to have conflated Marco Polo's Greater Java with Fine's Regio Patalis and Brasielie Regio.Robert J. King, "The Jagiellonian Globe, a Key to the Puzzle of Jave la Grande", The Globe, no. 62, 2009, pp. 1-50. A high-resolution image of Fine's 1531 world map, Nova Universi Orbis Descriptio, can be found at: On the Dieppe Maps, the great promontory of JAVE LA GRANDE (Greater Java) extends, like the Regio Patalis, northward from the Austral continent. The evolution of Fine's REGIO PATALIS into JAVE LA GRANDE may have been influenced by the phrase used by Ludovico di Varthema, an Italian from Bologna who made a voyage in 1505 from Borneo to Java, who said that Java "prope in inmensum patet" ("extends almost beyond measure").Simon Grynaeus and Johann Huttich, Novus Orbis Regionum, Basel, 1532, Ludovico di Varthema, Itinerario, p.271; cited in Franz von Wieser, Magalhães-Strasse und Austral-Continent. Auf den Globen Johannes Schöner. Beitrage zur Geschichte der Erdkunde im xvi. Jahrhundert, Innsbruck, 1881 (reprinted Amsterdam, Meridian, 1967), p. 67.