World's First Printed Atlas Sells for £2.1m -- Mistakes And All

Sotheby's auction house has sold a copy of the world's first printed atlas -- the Cosmographia -- for the record sum of £2,136,000. The 1478 book was the crown jewel of a 600 piece collection owned by Lord Wardington, who passed away last year. It was one of only two copies still in private hands and went to an unnamed private collector (just look for the befuddled billionaire who can't find New York).

Ptolemy -- a second century Greek-speaking geographer, astronomer and astrologer -- compiled information from the Greeks and Romans to create a 'Geographica' that eventually became the foundation of the 1478 printed work. As you might expect, there are some gross inaccuracies; the undiscovered Americas are entirely absent and familiar landmasses tend to be distorted, resulting in a slightly alien world.

Don't fret if you haven't got a couple of million quid lying around for your own copy; a team of Swiss researchers at Bern University published a complete German version at the end of September, and an annotated translation of the technical chapters can be yours for a mere $32.95.

Old atlas breaks auction record
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