California as an island

What this plate depicts

California is drawn as a large, carrot-shaped island off western North America, separated by a gulf labeled as a sea. Coastal names, bays, and islands are written on the island’s Pacific face. The mainland to the east is a separate mass. This is what the plate actually claims: an insular California, not a peninsula. The depiction circulated on European maps for about a century after Spanish coastal reconnaissance had already found Baja attached.

Source

Library of Congress; Wikimedia Commons scan of the c. 1650 manuscript.

License

Public domain.