Amerigo Vespucci writes in the Mundus Novus that "I have resolved, Magnificent Lorenzo, that, just as I have given you an account by letter of what happened to me, I shall send you two depictions of the world, made and ordered by my own hand and knowledge: one will be a flat rendering and the other a map of the world in spherical form. . . ." (Vespucci 1992, 17).
The Dedication from Vespucci to Lorenzo di Pier Francesco de'Medici
in the 1504 Mundus Novus.
[Written in the popular language of the time: Latin]
In a later letter to Lorenzo, he writes that the "new regions" can be called "a new world" since they were unknown previously to Europeans (Vespucci 1995, 45). In an undated fragment of a letter, Vespucci responds to criticisms that have been made of his writings. In one place he declares: "I do not know what ignorant person asks you such a thing about a familiar letter, for to tell you the truth, it does me too much honor to think that my letter should be treated as a great composition, whereas I wrote it haphazardly, as familiar letters are written. But all in all I put my trust in God’s goodness, that He will grant me three years more of life to write, with the help of some scholar, something by which I might survive for a time after my death" (Vespucci 1992, 44).
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