Shown is Fra Mauro (b.1400), a Venetian monk with his famous map, showing the Known World of his day. He worked on it from 1448 to 1459.

Fra Mauro pieced together all the tidbits of information available to him from world travelers and merchants, ultimately arriving at an astonishingly accurate map, 6 feet square. An unexpected feature of the map for Us today is that North is at the bottom of the map, so Africa is at the top. (See “righted” image below.)

Many continents had not been “discovered”, but that gave everybody something to look forward to. Rhinos feel it could happen again, any day now. Why not?

Here is a blow-up, showing the wealth of detail included in the map itself. Zowie!

Mr. Ibn Battuta (b.1304) was a Moroccan Muslim who spent 40 years exploring the medieval Islamic world of his time. He went to Mecca 7 times during his lifetime, and many other places as well.

At that time it was investigation by the seat of the pants. He explored, travelled, and geographized. And got on boats! He wrote a book called ‘The Travels’.

Had Mr. Ibn Battuta lacked an Inner Rhino, We wonder what might have become of him. Curiosity is hard on cats, but it often helps Rhinos thrive. Case in point, yes?