Piri Reis Map

The Piri Reis Map is another topic of mystery from the tv show Ancient Aliens. The show presents the map as being created possibly millions of years ago, at a time when Antarctica was not only undiscovered, but ice free as well. The tv show suggests that perhaps aliens created it, but for what purpose?

The map is said to show a very accurate representation of all the land masses including Antarctica, but when accurately lined up with a modern map the truth is shown. The Piri Reis map is a pretty good drawing of the western coast of Europe, North Africa, the coast of Brazil, Azores islands, and the Canary islands. The mythical island Antillia is also represented on the Piri Reis map.

The part of the map that represents North America is not very accurate, and the part that is supposed to be Antarctica looks to be more probably south America drawn sideways (like when you are writing a big word and you run out of paper so you start to bend the word to fit it).

Piri Reis was a Turkish military sailor and a map maker, he was not an explorer. On the side of the Piri Reis map can clearly be seen the notes Piri Reis wrote about the construction of the map. Piri Reis writes that the map is a composite of 20 other maps, including maps made by Christopher Columbus. The Piri Reis map was made by Piri Reis in 1513.

It has been suggested that Piri Reis might have had access to the Library of Alexander, and thereby was able to obtain maps of alien origin. The map as we know it is only part of the map, it was originally a world map that has been torn off. The map is only one map that is from a body of work Piri Reis created that contained many maps, as well navigation tips and information about the different people that lived in the different areas. Piri Reis also created a second world map a few years after the first.

Though the idea that Piri Reis got ancient maps from the Library of Alexander is a good one, there are just too many glaring errors in the map to be likely to have been created with an alien influence. The land mass of North America is very large and should be better depicted if drawn by aliens. If the land mass at the bottom of the map is indeed Antarctica why is it connected to south America if this map was drawn by aliens? Why was the mythical island of Antillia represented on the map it was created by aliens, when the island does not exist? Piri Reis own homeland is not very accurately represented on the map.

To be sure, there are some very interesting things about this map. The area of south America is surprisingly accurate and detailed for its time. It uses maps that could quite possibly be "lost maps of Columbus". It is the only map of the sixteenth century to have south America in the right spot in relation to Africa.

All in all, Piri Reis is pretty clear in his notes that he put right on the map, how he made the map.

As an extra note, it seems most of the Antarctica coast is rock, meaning the coastline would look mostly the same if the ice melted.

I give this a 1 on the mystery scale. Let me know what you think.

1 = no mystery
2 = possible mystery
3 = total mystery

Full list of Articles