GUEST: I used to run a business where I made, um, jewelry out of old silverware and door hardware, and I went to an auction in Durham, New Hampshire, and there was no silverware there or door hardware, but there was this map, and I figured I'd wait around to see what it would go for. I'd never been to an auction before, so when it came up, I was really eager and anxious, so I put my paddle up, and, uh, no one else did, so...
APPRAISER: What did you end up buying it for?
GUEST: Five dollars.
APPRAISER: (chuckles)
GUEST: It was shaped like an eyeball, so I figured I'd turn it into a... (laughing): ...an eyeball eventually, with, in an art piece. I liked that there were mermaids and different characters on it-- it was unusual. So when I got home, I looked it up, and when I didn't see anything about it, I figured, "We better hold onto it." So it's been on the wall above the fireplace for about ten years now, and, uh, I swore I would, I wouldn't find out what it was worth until I got a chance to bring it here.
APPRAISER: (chuckles)
GUEST: And sure enough... (laughs)
APPRAISER: Here you are.
GUEST: Yeah.
APPRAISER: So what this is is the 1457 Genoese world map, which was a map of the world as Europeans saw it, about 40 years before Columbus sailed and before Vasco da Gama around the southern coast of Africa to get to India. It's really a fascinating map, full of many mysteries. This three-masted European ship in the Indian Ocean, long before any European ship is known to have done so. It, of course, shows Europe, and Asia, and Africa, but it's missing some important geography. Do you notice what it's missing?
GUEST: No, I never looked that hard. (chuckles) I was too busy focused on the folklore than I was on the geography.
APPRAISER: Well, it's missing the Americas.
GUEST: Oh. (laughs) You'd think I would've noticed that.
APPRAISER: And it's missing Australia.
GUEST: Oh.
APPRAISER: Um, all of which were unknown to these mapmakers at the time. What does everybody want to see on old maps? Unicorns, dragons, mermaids, and sea monsters.
GUEST: (laughs)
APPRAISER: And this map provides that.
GUEST: Well, I remember seeing him first. My little devil fella. And then I think there's a mermaid somewhere-- oh, there she is. And that, those were the first things that I was, like, "This is super-cool."
APPRAISER: This guy in particular, that you pointed out first, is a fascinating character. He shows up in the 15th century when this map was made in a number of sources, and is described as climbing onto the beach to pull cows off and eat them.
GUEST: Oh, wow.
APPRAISER: You also have these great castellated towns all throughout the world, including one here on the back of an elephant in Africa. This is all in keeping with how maps were made in the 1450s and 1460s. Now, this map is not actually from 1450.
GUEST: No.
APPRAISER: As you probably picked out.
GUEST: Yeah.
APPRAISER: Uh, this map was made for a guy named Edward Luther Stevenson...
GUEST: Okay.
APPRAISER: ...who was a fascinating character. He was an orphaned farm boy who was born in Illinois in 1858, and really pulled himself up to become one of the foremost scholars of American history at the time.
GUEST: Oh.
APPRAISER: He was a professor at Rutgers, and he realized from his travels in Europe that teaching his students would be so much easier if he only had accurate representations of the maps that he was studying there to show them. It's quite rare. I don't think that it's probably been on the market since you bought it at that auction.
GUEST: Oh, really?
APPRAISER: In a retail environment, I could see this being $4,000 to $5,000.
GUEST: Holy moly. Wow! (both laugh) I never thought that-- that's crazy. Five turned into a lot, just in a second. That's wonderful news. Thank you so much.
APPRAISER: Yeah, you're welcome-- it's really special.
GUEST: I guess so. Way more than I thought. (chuckles) I'm glad I...
APPRAISER: I'm glad that you didn't cut it up.
GUEST: I was just going to say, I'm glad I didn't turn it into an eyeball, yeah. (both laugh)
