ABSTRACT
This chapter argues that older, pre-modern geographies encompassed a wider arc. Cosmography has been replaced by geography. The general picture of Claudius Ptolemy outlined to geography undergraduates, then as now, ignored the other Ptolemy, the Ptolemy who seemed to be out of step with the scientific project. Ptolemy wrote on astronomy, astrology, geography, mathematics, optics and music. The translation of Claudius Ptolemy's work, particularly his Geography, was an important event in the Renaissance; his work not only reinvigorated geographical interest, cartographic projections and artistic expression but his Almagest and Tetrabiblos helped lay the foundation of a sophisticated astrology. In geography, in contrast, Ptolemy's basic model of describing the earth was improved rather than overturned; the improvements included extending the known world, better measuring of the world and refining the measures of latitude and longitude. Modern geography emerged from a broader cosmography; and the birth-marks persisted.
