When we all think of Norway, we conjure images of frostbite, Bjorn Borg, and a connection to the Ottomans. If Oslo isn't a Nordic interpretation of Istanbul, nothing is.
And that connection continues today, as a research librarian at Norway's National Library stumbled upon a rare Ottoman atlas buried deep in the archives. So rare, in fact, that it's only one of possibly 14 known left in existence. And how did he figure out the rare Ottoman atlas was, indeed, that?
From Reddit, of course.
Anders Kvernberg, the librarian at the center of this story, could make out that the atlas was Ottoman and from 1803, so he posted a picture of it on /r/MapPorn on Reddit, just for fun. As way leads to way, someone commented on his picture and let Kvernberg know it wasn't just any atlas, but the Cedid Atlas Tercumesi, the first atlas published in the Muslim world. Only 50 copies were ever made, with one being given to the sultan of the Ottoman Empire at the time, Selim III. Today, only 14 known copies remain, although some estimates suggest the total is closer to 10 copies.
So how did such a rare book end up "lost" in a library? The atlas was cataloged originally when they came to own it 60-years ago, but after being stashed away it went unnoticed during a digital cataloging years later, and remained "lost" until Kvernberg stumbled upon it.
If only there was a map to all the lost maps in the world.
Bjorn Borg is Swedish, but you didn't even notice that, did you? Because Sweden, Norway, and Finland are really just one giant snowy land mass filled with blonde people and ABBA.
photo: Cedid Atlas Tercumesi on /r/MapPorn
No comments:
Post a Comment