divide the North. And the water rushes round and descends into the earth just as if one were pouring it through a filter funnel. It is 4 degrees wide on every side of the Pole, that is to say eight degrees altogether. Except that right under the Pole there lies a bare rock in the midst of the Sea. Its circumference is almost 33 French miles, and it is all of magnetic stone. And is as high as the clouds, so the Priest said, who had received the astrolabe from this Minorite in exchange for a Testament. And the Minorite himself had heard that one can see all round it from the Sea, and that it is black and glistening. And nothing grows thereon, for there is not so much as a handful of soil on it." The persistence of this idea of the geography of the far north persisted throughout the 16th and 17th century. This is probably due to the influence of Ruysch, Mercator, and Ortelius. Maps were only revised when the region was explored and mapmakers obtained knowledge of the true geography of the Arctic. More interesting to modern researchers are the people the friar encountered, "pygmies" who may well be identical with the Skrælings referred to in old Norse texts about Greenland, predecessors of the modern Inuit. The John Day letter In 1956 a letter referring to the existence of the book was found in the Archivo General de Simancas (Spain) from the English merchant John Day to "The Most Magnificent And Most Worthy Lord - The Lord Grand Admiral" (presumably Christopher Columbus). In the letter, written in either December 1497 or January 1498, John Day says, "...Your Lordship's servant brought me your letter. I have seen its contents and I would be most desirous and most happy to serve you. I do not find the book Inventio Fortunata, and I thought that I (or he) was bringing it with my things, and I am very sorry not [to] find it because I wanted very much to serve you. I am sending the other book of Marco Polo and a copy of the land which has been found [by John Cabot]…" References Further reading The Mythic Geography of the Northern Polar Regions: Inventio fortunata and Buddhist Cosmology, by Chet Van Duzer 14th-century books Lost books Historical geography Geography books Geography of the Arctic Exploration of the