Agostino Vespucci's De situ, longitudine, forma et divisione totius
Hispaniae libellus represents one of the first, most thorough and lively
Renaissance descriptions of Iberia. Combining the genres of chorography,
travel literature and the diplomatic report, the book deals with the
country's geography, ethnography, recent history and Roman antiquities,
merging the past with the present and having recourse to both literary
sources and the author's own investigations. As Vespucci's only extant
literary work, it sheds light on his humanist activity and political
ideas, and it allows us to assess the influence that figures such as
Poliziano and Machiavelli exercised on him. The manuscript treatise,
which was dedicated and presented to Cardinal Giulio de' Medici (later
Pope Clement VII) in 1520, is edited here for the first time.