Records show that Waldseemüller was enrolled in 1490 at the University of Freiburg, where Gregor Reisch, a noted humanist scholar, was one of his influential teachers;[1][2] the printer Johannes Schott was his classmate.

The Soderini Letter gave Vespucci credit for discovery of this new continent and implied that newly obtained Portuguese maps were based on his explorations.

In a preface to the letter, Ringmann wrote "I see no reason why anyone could properly disapprove of a name derived from that of Amerigo, the discoverer, a man of sagacious genius.

A suitable form would be Amerige, meaning Land of Amerigo, or America, since Europe and Asia have received women's names.

The map and globe were notable for showing the New World as a continent separate from Asia and for naming the southern landmass America.

[11][12] Nevertheless, his maps were recognized as important contributions to the science of cartography and were considered a standard reference work for many decades.

[13] About 20 of Waldseemüller's tabulae modernae (modern maps) were included in the new Geography as a separate appendix, Claudii Ptolemaei Supplementem.

[15] The world map published in the 1513 Geography seems to indicate that Waldseemüller had second thoughts about the name and the nature of the lands discovered in the western Atlantic.

The New World was no longer clearly shown as a continent separate from Asia, and the name America had been replaced with Terra Incognita (Unknown Land).

What caused him to make these changes is not clear, but perhaps he was influenced by contemporary criticism that Vespucci had usurped Columbus's primacy of discovery.

In 1508, he contributed a treatise on surveying and perspective to the fourth edition of Gregor Reisch's Margarita Philosophica.

[18] The 1507 wall map was lost for a long time, but a copy was found in Schloss Wolfegg in southern Germany by Joseph Fischer in 1901.