California on map
The first known mention of the legend of the "Island of California" was in the 1510 romance novel Las sergas de Esplandián by Garci Rodríguez de Montalvo-the sequel to Montalvo's more famous tales of Amadís de Gaula, father of Esplandian.
There are slightly over 1,000 maps of California as an island in Stanford's Glen McLaughlin Collection of California as an Island, the largest collection of such maps in the world. A French map from 1682 only shows the tip of the Baja Peninsula. A 1626 Portuguese map depicts the land as a peninsula, while a 1630 British map depicts it as an island. For instance, a Spanish map from 1548 depicts California as a peninsula, while a 1622 Dutch map depicts California as an island. From the mid-1500s to the late 1700s great controversy surrounded the geography of California. This mapping error was not a one-off event. The legend was initially infused with the idea that California was a terrestrial paradise, like the Garden of Eden or Atlantis. One of the most famous cartographic errors in history, it was propagated on many maps during the 17th and 18th centuries, despite contradictory evidence from various explorers. The Island of California ( Spanish: Isla de California) refers to a long-held global misconception, dating from the 16th century, that the California region was not part of mainland North America but rather a large island separated from the continent by a strait now known as the Gulf of California. The "Island of California", on a 1650 map by Nicolas Sanson A satellite view of the Baja California peninsula and the Gulf of California The compass rose in the center of the map marks the approximate location of the modern United States–Mexico border, south of San Diego. For the rock music album, see Dirty Heads.