The only surviving copy of the 500-year-old map that first used the name America went on permanent display at the Library of Congress yesterday. The “Exploring the Early Americas” exhibit focuses on the history and legacies of the Americas and the impact of European contact, culture and conquest. The display is located in the Northwest Galleries of the Great Hall of the Thomas Jefferson Building in Washington, D.C.

Seven interactive touch-screen displays surround the artifacts, and provide a window to explore the history that the artifacts represent.

The Waldseemüller’s 1507 World Map was the first document of any kind on which the name “America” appears and the first map to depict a separate and full Western Hemisphere, with the Pacific as a separate ocean.

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