A portion of John White's map "Virgenia Pars." A patch on the map covers a symbol for a fort. © The Trustees of the British Museum
Researchers from the U.S. and U.K. announced earlier today that a 16th century map of coastal Virginia and North Carolina reveals the location of a planned fort or settlement. And, they suggest, that spot, at the confluence of the Roanoke and Chowan rivers, may be where settlers from the Lost Colony headed.
The lozenge shape on John White’s “Virgenia Pars”, which researchers suggest represents a fort, was discovered when experts at the British Museum used lights and other techniques to study details hidden by a patch on the map.
from Examination of patches on a map of the east coast of North America by John White ("La Virginea Pars";1906,0509.1.3), CSR ANALYTICAL REQUEST NO. AR2012-21 . © The Trustees of the British Museum
A panel of historians and archaeologists assembled by the First Colony Foundation discussed their findings and theories this morning at Wilson Library in Chapel Hill. Panelist James Horn, an historian and author of A Kingdom Strange: The Brief and Tragic History of the Lost Colony of Roanoke, says that before John White left his fellow colonists in 1587, the settlers had already discussed moving about 50 miles inland. That distance roughly compares to the location of the fort depicted on the map. Additional details of the First Colony Foundation’s research and theories are here.
White’s “Virgenia Pars” map is considered relatively accurate in its depiction of the region’s geography. And The News and Observer reports that the site of the planned fort or settlement is “near Scotch Hall Preserve, a golf course and residential community just across the Albemarle Sound from Edenton.”
Although archaeologists expect to study the area of the planned fort or settlement, a timeline for such work has yet to be disclosed.
if there was a fort and the colony did head there, wouldn’t there had been something recorded in the logs of this? either at the settlement or at the so called fort?
Excuse me, but one thing crosses my mind over this finding, well actually more than one, but the main one. If the colonists had moved to what appears to be the other side of the bay. Just 2 rivers over, why weren’t they found? I’m sure that if they had built a fort 50 miles away John White, especially if he knew that that might be possible, would have looked there. Ok, and lets say that he might not have. This mystery is so talked about, and I’m sure even back then it was talked about, someone of that time would have said “Oh yeah! Them? They live over there.”, or even, “Oh yeah! Our grandparents told us about that, and were the lost colonies decendants.” Someone would have known about a new fort created. This makes no sense, and I think that they are just grasping at straws. Give me proof before you say something is solved. And don’t form an expert panel and tell me something that even a woman with just a BA in nursing from the center of the US can see is so full of holes that it wouldn’t hold chickpee’s.
As the son of a cartographer in my very early days and a fellow of the Royal Geographic Society in London I have had access to some very old maps dating older than this one. My take on the diamond underneath the patch is that it is nothing more than a North South East and West directional marker.
1) My reasoning is very simple, the 4 points point in the respective directions.
2) the 4 pointed diamond design is inappropriately out of scale as a structure when the rest of the map is in scale. A good detailed map maker I suspect. The diamond is obviously from another hand and another time.
I would follow the principle that a simpler theory is the right one. Attempting to put 21st century thoughts into a situation and settlement in a wild land nearly half a millenium ago is ridiculous. I suspect it will help sell his book but I will follow my gut on this one and say its a directional marker. Ink in those days was fairly organic and would have damaged/eaten the paper down the road hence the paper patch.
-One smart printer
It seems strange that John White did not tell anyone about this feature on the map. If it was a hidden secret and he was desperate to find his family. Why did he not disclose the information? If he had done so one might conclude that Capitain John Smith of Jamestown might have had a better chance to find the colonists. Or did John White take this information to his grave? It just seems strange that there is not other historical documentation to corroborate the meaning of this discovery.
Is it weird that the boat in the enhanced second image looks different? It looks like its being blown away from shore by wind. If you squint, it even looks like there is a wake along the bow. Probably just a trick of the lighting.
John, there is only a small chance that the symbol is a compass rose. The points do not, in fact, point due north, south, east, and west. Rather, they point quite nearly to northeast, northwest, southeast, and southwest. Moreover, the symbol is similar to forts that White painted when the crew reprovisioned in the Caribbean on their way to Roanoke. The symbol’s shape resembles the standard pentagram fort of the era, which were designed to minimize the impact of incoming projectiles. Rather than constructing the fort with four straight walls, builders angled them so that incoming cannon balls would not perpendicularly strike any wall. In all liklihood, the symbol on the map is a planned fort or a fort that the colonists constructed while in the area, as Algonquian settlements were normally circular.
if you go to the British museums website for this map further analysis shows that the red “compass rose” covers another diagram that corresponds very much to a fort similar to the types then in use. I theorize that the red area was actually a line denoting the clearing around the fort, but the red ink used at that time bled over the outlines to the fort. As for the wake of the ship going the wrong way, the original pencil outline of the map (before it was colorized) shows the ship sailing in the opposite direction.