Here’s a 1950 map of Earth, 7 years before Sputnik launched:
Here’s a 1900AD map of Earth, 57 years before Sputnik:
And a 1900 globe projection of Earth:
And an 1850 map of Earth. It’s getting a bit rougher at the north and south poles, which were barely explored at the time.
An 1852 map:
A 1798 map of the world: not much worse than 1850.
By 1750, there were some real blanks at the far edges of the world from Europe:
1700 map - not much worse than 1750, allowing for the limits of the projection.
1630 map - missing a certain land down under:
1570: definitely some room for improvement, but the cartographer’s heart (and continents) are in the right places.
1502: a few holes here and there, but it was up to date with European explorations.
Short answer: yes, we figured out the shape of continents before satellites.