In 1597 "Abraham Ortelius became the first person to draw a map of Odysseus's travels. Like many Homeric geographers, Ortelius identifies Scheria, home of the Phaeacians, with Corcyra (now known as Corfu) because of a passage from Thucydides' 'History of the Peloponnesian War' claiming the Phaeacians were the previous inhabitants of that island. While widely accepted, this identification of Scheria with Corcyra creates a problem. Homer clearly places Calypso's island west of Scheria, but there is no island in the Ionian Sea west of Corcyra. Ortelius, following in the footsteps of Pliny, mapped a nonexistent island off southern Italy and called it the home of Calypso. The imaginary island appeared on maps through the mid-nineteenth century, and individuals continued to search for it into the twentieth. (Perhaps it had sunk into the sea?)" (Zazzera).

The Map
The main image shows the northern part of the Indian Ocean. There are three insets: The Mediterranean Sea, showing the "errors of Ulysses"; a circular inset, "Annonis Periplus", at the top left, representing the Northwest coast of Africa; and a second circular inset of the north pole at the top right. The inset Hyperborei has been added, as Ortelius puts it, "for better beautifying or proportioning of this map" and to remind the reader that despite all their exertions, a passage to the Far East via the North Pole has not yet been found by the English or the Dutch.

The map was first published in 1601. The present example comes from 'Theatri Orbis Terrarum Parergon'. Antwerpen. Balthasar Moretus, 1624. (Van der Krogt 3, 31:711).