The International Prester John Project: How A Global Legend Was Created Across Six Centuries

Giovanni da Carignano

Born in Genoa, Giovanni da Carignano (1250-1329) was a rector and later a priest turned famed cartographer. He is known as the first European to accurately plot Ethiopia on a map, as well as the first European to locate the kingdom of Prester John in Ethiopia. Additionally, he is famous for providing the only historical evidence of the 1306 Ethiopian mission that arrived in Rome.

Carignano produced a portolan chart and commentary, both of which are now lost, the former more recently than the latter. Carignano's lost portolan map, which survives only in pre-WWII photographs, is signed "Presbiter Johannes Rector sancti Marci de portu Ianue me fecit." 

Salvadore (p. 1) notes that his appointment in 1291 to the position of rector at San Marco al Molo, located in the Madraccio, Genoa's old port, provided Giovanni with a congregation of mercantile seafarers who likely shared stories of their travels. 


of the San Marco Church in Genoa.

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