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ANTILIA

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Originally appearing in Volume V02, Page 126 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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ANTILIA or ANTILLIA, sometimes called the See also:

Island of the Seven Cities (Portuguese See also:Isla das Sete Cidades), a legendary island in the See also:Atlantic ocean. The origin of the name is quite uncertain. The See also:oldest suggested See also:etymology (1455) fancifully connects it with the name of the Platonic See also:Atlantis, while later writers have endeavoured to derive it from the Latin anterior (i.e. the island that is reached " before " Cipango), or from the Jezirat at Tennyn, " See also:Dragon's Isle," of the Arabian geographers. Antilia is marked in an See also:anonymous See also:map which is dated 1424 and preserved in the See also:grand-ducal library at See also:Weimar. It reappears in the maps of the Genoese B. Beccario or See also:Beccaria (1435), and of the Venetian See also:Andrea Bianco (1436), and again in 1455 and 1476. In most of these it is accompanied by the smaller and equally legendary islands of Royllo, St Atanagio, and Tan See also:mar, the whole See also:group being classified as insulae de now repartee, " newly discovered islands." The Florentine See also:Paul Toscanelli, in his letters to See also:Columbus and the Portuguese See also:court (1474), takes Antilia as the See also:principal landmark for measuring the distance between See also:Lisbon and the island of Cipango or Zipangu (See also:Japan). One of the See also:chief See also:early descriptions of Antilia is that inscribed on the globe which the geographer See also:Martin See also:Behaim made at See also:Nuremberg in 1492 (see MAP: See also:History). Behaimrelates that in 734—a date which is probably a misprint for 714—and after' the See also:Moors had conquered See also:Spain and See also:Portugal, the island of Antilia or " Septe Cidade " was colonized by See also:Christian refugees under the See also:archbishop of See also:Oporto and six bishops. The inscription adds that a See also:Spanish See also:vessel sighted the island in 1414... According to an old Portuguese tradition each of the seven leaders founded and ruled a See also:city, and the whole island became a Utopian See also:common-See also:wealth, See also:free from the disorders of less favoured states. Later Portuguese tradition localized Antilia in the island of St See also:Michael's, the largest of the See also:Azores.

It is impossible to estimate how far this See also:

legend commemorates some actual but imperfectly recorded See also:discovery, and how far it is a See also:reminiscence of the See also:ancient See also:idea of an See also:elysium in the western seas which is embodied in the legends of the Isles of the Blest or Fortunate Islands.

End of Article: ANTILIA

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