Details from Carta del Cantino, 1502, Estensi Digital Library, Biblioteca Estense Universitaria, Modena, with permission pending the Ministry of Cultural Heritage and Activities, Italy (left); Caverio, Planisphère nautique, 1506, Bibliothèque Nacionale de France, Paris (center); and Waldseemüller, Universalis Cosmographia, 1507, Geography and Map Division, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. (right).

The first visual code for the Americas was the color green–as seen on La Cosa’s Carta Universal. Parrots soon became another, especially for South America. In 1502 on Carta del Cantino large scarlet macaws were painted with such detail that they may have been directly observed by the chartmaker or illuminator. Less defined, but still recognizable parrots repeat on Nicolay de Caverio’s Planisphère nautique of 1506, while a much plainer bird that requires a label to convey that it is a red parrot appears on Waldseemüller’s Universalis Cosmographia of 1507. As the parrot moves from chart to chart and from manuscript chart to printed map, it loses detail and complexity.