Claudio Tolomeo was born in Ptolemaist (Upper Egypt) in 100 AD and died in Canopus in 160 AD. He lived in Alexandria in the second century of the Christian age, and was an astronomer, mathematician, geographer, cartographer and one of the greatest scientists of all time. For centuries his works influenced science in Europe and up until at least 1600, and still today, his Geography is the prototype for all atlases, and several of his innovations still prevail in modern cartography, and the saying holds that geographic maps “are still written with Tolomeo’s alphabet”.
The Urbinate Latin manuscript 277 “Cosmography of Claudio Tolomeo” is a Latin translation of the Greek text of Claudio Tolomeo’s Geography. It was translated into Latin between 1406 and 1410 by Jacopo Angelo from Scarperia, who worked in the Papal Chancellery in Rome, and he then dedicated to the then Pope Alessandro V.

On the first page of the manuscript there is an illumination showing Angelo offering his manuscript to the Pope. The manuscript was then transcribed in Florence by Ugo Comminelli, copyist and artistic writer, helped by the cartographer Pietro del Massaio and the expert hands of other illuminators and gilders to be finally completed in 1472.
This artistic alliance reached its height with this codex, which is a work of art of amazing elegance and style and a splendid example of Italian book art in the XV century.
The codex was first owned by Federico da Montefeltro (1422 – 1482), a Count and later Duke of Urbino, condottiere and bibliophile. We do not know if Federico da Montefeltro effectively commissioned the Cosmography or whether he received it as a gift for his merits or friendship.