Abraham Cresques


Cresques Abraham was a 14th-century Jewish cartographer from Palma, Majorca, then part of the Crown of Aragon. In collaboration with his son, Jehuda Cresques, Cresques is credited with the authorship of the celebrated Catalan Atlas of 1375.

Personal life

A Majorcan Jew, Cresques was a master map-maker and builder of clocks, compasses, and other nautical instruments. He was a leading member of the Majorcan cartographic school.
Cresques Abraham's liturgical Hebrew name was Elisha son of Rabbi Abraham, son of Rabbi Benaviste, son of Rabbi Elisha. His common name, Cresques Abraham, means that Abraham was his patronym i.e. his father's name; but the order is often flipped in most subsequent literature. His son, Jehuda Cresques, was also a notable cartographer.

The Catalan Atlas

In 1375, Cresques and his son Jehuda received an assignment from Prince John of Aragon, the future John I of Aragon, to make a set of nautical charts which would go beyond the normal geographic range of contemporary portolan charts to cover the East and the West, and everything that, from the Strait leads to the West.
For this job, Cresques and Jehuda were paid 150 Aragonese golden florins, and 60 Mallorcan pounds, respectively, as it is stated in 14th-century documents from the Prince and his father Peter IV of Aragon. Prince John intended to present the chart to his cousin Charles, later to be Charles VI, King of France, as a gift. In that year 1375 Cresques and Jehuda drew the six charts that composed the Catalan Atlas at their house in the Jewish quarter of Palma.

Works attributed to Cresques

The Catalan Atlas of c. 1375 is the only map that has been confidently attributed to Cresques Abraham. Researchers have suggested that five other existing maps might also be attributed to Cresques, Jehuda or some other worker in the Cresques atelier. Like the Catalan Atlas itself, these five maps, are unsigned and undated, and their date of composition estimated sometime between 1375 and 1400.
According to Campbell, of the four portolan charts attributed the Cresques atelier, the Naples and Paris charts are more ornate than the other two, with the Paris chart in particular seeming closest to the features of the Catalan Atlas. However, attribution to the Cresques workshop is only tentative. As Campbell notes, "That this group of charts is closely related is clear. But it is hard to see, from the colour analysis alone, evidence to confirm that these four charts were the product of supervised work in a single atelier."
Cresques also produced an illuminated Bible with an annexed Hebrew-Catalan dictionary, known as the Farhi Bible.