Padrón Real

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The Padrón Real was the official and secret Spanish master map used as a template for the maps present on all Spanish ships during the 1500s.

The Padrón Real was constantly improved from its first version in 1508.^[1] It was produced by the Seville-based Spanish organization, the Casa de Contratación, established in 1503. All returning ships had to report any details of new lands or discoveries they had made to the Casa de Contratación, together with latitudes and longitudes. The ship's officers were put under oath before they testified. The pilots at the Casa de Contratación then plotted this information on their maps. When a new ship was setting out, they would then be given charts which were copied from the master map, the Padrón Real, which was later called the Padrón General.

Almost none of these maps have survived, but there were occasionally copies made for foreign princes and dignitaries, and some of them still exist. For example, in the Biblioteca Medicea-Laurenziana in Florence, there is a map believed to be copied from the Padrón Real called the "Salviati Planisphere." This Planisphere map was probably given by the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V to Cardinal Giovanni Salviati, the papal nuncio, in 1526. In the archive of the Marchesi Castiglione in Mantua there is another similar world map, produced about the same time and given by the Emperor to Count Baldassare Castiglione. There are a few other examples of these world maps copied from the Padrón Real that were given to various German princes. The most impressive copy of the Padrón Real is in the Vatican Library, and was given to the Pope by the Emperor in 1529.

The Padrón Real was similar in principle to the Portuguese secret master map, the Padrão Real, developed by the Portuguese organization Casa da India, or House of India, which had been established in Lisbon in 1500 (or 1501 according to some sources), and lasted until 1755.

[edit] Mapmakers

This enterprise was a huge undertaking, and it was taken very seriously. Without good navigational aids, the ability of Spain to exploit and profit from its discoveries would have been limited. The Casa de Contratación had a large number of cartographers and navigators (pilots), archivists, record keepers, administrators and others involved prodcing and managing the Padrón Real.

The famous Amerigo Vespucci, who made at least two voyages to the New World, was a pilot working at the Casa de Contratación until his death in 1512. A special position was created for Vespucci, the "pilot major" (chief of navigation) in 1508. He had the responsibility of training new pilots for ocean voyages. His nephew Juan Vespucci inherited his famous uncle's maps, charts, and nautical instruments, and was appointed to Amerigo's former position as official Spanish government pilot at Seville. In 1524, Juan Vespucci was appointed Examiner of Pilots, replacing Sebastian Cabot who was then leading an expedition in Brazil.

In the 1530s and 1540s, the principal mapmakers (known as "cosmographers") in the Casa de Contratación working on the Padrón Real included Alonso de Santa Cruz, Sebastian Cabot, and Pedro de Medina.

Mapmaker Diego Gutiérrez was named cosmographer in the Casa de la Contratación by royal appointment on October 22, 1554, after the death of his father Diego in January 1554, and worked on the Padrón Real. In 1562 Diego Gutierrez, published a remarkable map entitled "Americae ... Descriptio" in Antwerp. The reason it was published in Antwerp instead of Spain was that the Spanish engravers did not have the necessary skill to print such a complicated document. Other cosmographers included Alonso de Chaves, Francisco Falero, Jerónimo de Chaves, Sancho Gutiérrez (Diego's brother).

In the late 1500s, Juan Lopez de Velasco was cosmographer major in Seville. He produced a master map and twelve subsidiary maps portraying the worldwide Spanish Empire in cartographic form. This feat surpassed anything done by other European powers at that time. However, this signalled the end of Spain supremacy in mapmaking, and after the work of Velasco, others such as the English, Dutch and French were better able to organize and present geographic information.