Early Maps of Long Island

Maps made in the 17th Century help show how Europe came to understand Long Island. Italian explorer Giovanni da Verrazano entered New York Harbor in 1524, but it was not until 1609 that the Englishman Henry Hudson sailed farther inland and found the river that would bear his name. In 1613-14, Dutch mariner Adrian Block sailed around Long Island and returned home with information that helped chart the East Coast. Here are two Dutch maps made from 1635 to 1656.

    

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State University at Stony Brook Library, Special Collections Department

Dutch cartographer William Janszoon Blaeu based this 1635 map on charts drawn after the 1613-14 journey of Adrian Block. The map is notable for its illustrations, such as the Indian canoes in the ocean. Blaeu also depicted Long Island as a reries of islands, not a large landmass. The Algonquain word "Matouwacs" is not easily translated today, but a 19th Century linguist believed it meant "Island of the Periwinkle". The map is unusual to today's eye because it is oriented with west at the top.

 

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Long Island Studies Institute

This is a Dutch map; the cartographer was Nicholaes Visscher. The detali seen above prominentyly features the Dutch words Lang Eylandt, for Long Island, ovet the Angonquian words Matouwacs. The map reflects the growth of Dutch and English settlements on Long Island, including "S. Holt" on the North Fork, for Southold, and "Garner's Eylant," for the island owned by Englishman Lion Gardiner. It also shows the island as a land mass and not a series of islands divided by channels, as on the Bleau map. The map is the first to feature the evidence of the Hempstead Plains, according to cartography scholar David Allen, author of "Long Island Maps and Their Makers; Five Centuries of Cartographic History" (Amereon Ltd.) The plains are designated here by the words "Gebroken Landt," for broken land.

This was featured in Newsday, part of their "Our Story" on going articles. You can find their home page at:       Newsday, Long Island

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