One of the most important geographical and topographical works of the Quattrocento, the Italia Illustrata of Flavio Biondo, bridges the gap between Antiquity and modern times. In order to create a historical and geographical image of all of Italy Biondo resorts primarily to Roman classics: Vergil, Livy and Pliny, but also Ptolemy and Strabo. On the basis of Umbria the present contribution seeks to question two basic assumptions in current scholarship on Biondo: a) that a principle of organisation originating in Strabo plays an import role in the Italia Illustrata; b) that Biondo to a large extent had recourse to maps. Although neither assumption may be completely dismissed with, a detailed analysis indicates that Biondo primarily wrote his work according to the Graeco-Roman hodological model, only rarely (if at all) making use of maps.
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