[Bird’s-eye View of Amsterdam, first printed in Amsterdam in 1544, 3rd edition, 1553 or later].
Text in the cartouche in the upper right:
De vermaerde koopstadt/van Amstelredam/ geconterfeyt met alle sijn Wateren/ Bruggen / Straten /Kercken /Kloo=steren/ Huysen /Toorens /Poorten ende Mueren / ende omleggende situatie /gemackt ter eeren K.M. ende oock den Eersamen Raedt der selver Stadt/ ende allen Liefhebbern der Konste/etc.
Wtgegeven by Cornelis Anthonizoon Schilder/ met Octroye der K.M. onsen ghenadighsten Heere/ van’t selfde niet te moghen nae-drucken noch verkoopen binnen den tijdt van ses Jaren lanck gheduerende /ende ghedateert van den Jahre duysent vijf-hondert drie-en-veertigh / op seeckere penen int selfde Octroye begrepen / op dat hem een yegelijck voor schade verhoede mach.
Dese afbeeldinghe vindtmen te koop in die vermaerde koopstadt van Amstelredam achter de Nieuwe Kerck by den voorsz Cornelis Anthoniszoon, Schilder inde Schrijvende handt.
CMT 1544
(The famous merchant city of Amsterdam/ represented with all its waters/bridges/ streets/churches/monasteries/houses/ towers/gates and walls/and surrounding situation/made to the glory of our Royal Highness and also the honorable council of the said city/and all art-lovers/etc.
Published by Cornelis Antonizoon Painter/ with the Privilege granted by our gracious Lord the Royal Highness/not permitting any reprinting or selling of the same within the timespan of six years/dating from the year thousand fivehundred three and forty/ incurring with the same Privilege certain penalties [for infringement]/ so that thus he may be protected from any harm.
This depiction is to be found for purchase in the famous merchant city of Amsterdam behind the Nieuwe Kerck at the aforementioned Cornelis Anthoniszoon, Painter in the Writing Hand)
Publication Amsterdam, 1544 [1553 or later].
Description
Large wall map, woodcut with handcut and letterpress lettering on twelve sheets, mounted on linen.
The
first printed plan of Amsterdam
The first printed plan of Amsterdam.
Cornelis Anthonisz (1499-c1557) was a distinguished cartographer and painter, and official topographical artist to the Holy Roman Emperor. In 1538 he made a painting of Amsterdam, which he published in 1544, with his monogram and date visible under the letterpress text. It is a bird’s eye view taken from an imaginary vantage point over the harbour, looking southwards.
Anthonisz’ depiction was the source for plans of the city for the next seventy years, while his original blocks remained in circulation for over 110 years; all printings are rare: no example of the original printing of 1544 can currently be located; of this third state, which differs from the second state by the removal of the “Daniel 5. Mene Tekel Phares” in the imprint, Karrow records only four institutional locations.
This printing faithfully captures Amsterdam as it was in 1544, before the construction of the outer ring of canals, and celebrates the city’s proud maritime heritage, the title supported by a large figure of Poseidon and the foreground dominated by all manner of shipping.
The map shows the city of Amsterdam in the early decades of the sixteenth century, facing south, before the construction of the semi-circular ring of canals. It is bordered by the IJ, the Singel, a stretch of river Amstel, in the west and the Kloveniersburgwal and Gelderse Kade in the east. The waterway in the middle is labelled here “Den Amstel” in the South and “Damrack” in the North.
The map as such does not only give an impressive view of the topography of the city and its canals and buildings, but it abounds in detail to represent a thriving commercial hub that owes its tremendous wealth to merchants and seafarers, as can be concluded from the number of ships approaching and leaving the port and canals.
It is certainly not by accident that this map resembles the famous bird’s-eye view of Venice, composed in 1500 by Jacopo de Barbari. The angle at which Amsterdam is shown, the waters and canals dividing the urban districts from each other, and also including an ancient Roman deity such as Neptune, the god of the waters, all imply that Cornelis was familiar with this incredible example of Renaissance printmaking. In any case, it must have suited the commissioners of the original painting, the council of Amsterdam to present their flourishing city as Venice of the North to Charles V and also to those who could afford a print of the map to express their local pride.
Cornelis Anthoniszoon’s map became famous and very popular soon after it was first published in 1544, so that it continued to be printed in, probably, six editions until the seventeenth century. So far, no example of the first edition is known. We only know of the first edition from an account given by Johann David Passavant in the third part of his book Le Peintregraveur (1862), where he describes a copy from the private collection of
Watermark (on several sheets): A yet unidentified foolscap with four pointed extensions and two shorter ones with bells, including an elongated staff with three balls. Not identified in Churchill, Laurentius, Voorn or Heawood.
Condition: overall fine condition, untrimmed, and in loose sheets, some sheets a bit darkened in the corners, a few small areas of restoration to margins, perhaps pressed at some stage, apparently once framed (some dark lines in the margins do suggest this), very clean, printed on thin paper.
Dimensions (if joined) 1065 by 1095mm. (42 by 43 inches). Individual sheet measurements: (297 by 378mm; 242 by 387mm; 283 by 378mm; 287 by 392mm; 305 by 392mm; 287 by 387mm; 302 by 374mm; 304 by 387mm; 242 by 387mm; 304 by 393mm; 245 by 378mm; 308 by 387mm)
References Hollstein 47 (Cornelis Anthonisz. Teunissen); Karrow 6/11.3; cf. Exh. cat: Prints and the Pursuit of Knowledge in Early Modern Europe. Harvard Art Museums and Block Museum of Art. Ed. by Susan Dackerman. Cambridge/Mass. 2011, cat. no. 87.
£350,000
professor Joseph Martin von Reider (1793-1862) in Bamberg/Germany. This map was already untraceable for A.E. d’Ailly in 1934, when he compiled his Catalogus van Amsterdamsche Plattegronden, and it turns out that von Reider’s collection was dispersed already from 1858, when von Reider donated major parts of it to the Bavarian state. Today, neither the Staatliche Graphische Sammlung nor the Bayerisches Nationalmuseum in Munich can trace this map in their collections, although they had acquired major parts of von Reider’s print collection in 1920. It is possible that it must be counted among the losses of WW2. Subsequent editions can be distinguished from earlier ones by the number of wormholes in the woodblocks, but, above all, from the modified texts in the cartouche in the upper right. Spellings were reviewed already for the second edition, and in how far the third edition differed from the second, is not yet clearly established. However, d’Ailly assumed in 1936, that “Ian Iansz” who is mentioned as printer on the fourth edition, only added his name to the text of the cartouche, after he had taken over unsold prints of the third edition from Cornelis Anthoniszoon’s widow. The sixth edition was printed by Manuel Colijn, probably between 1636-1664. The date of 1544, when the map was first printed, remains prominent in all editions, probably to pay tribute to its inventor, who is mentioned in the cartouche throughout.
“Cornelis is celebrated for is talents as painter, draftsman and printmaker... Yet indivisible from these practices was the Amsterdamborn artist’s longtime preoccupation with mapmaking. Trained by his father in the art of engraving, Cornelis was the first printmaker to utilize that medium to chart the seas, at the time the primary conduit for trade in the Dutch Republic. In 1543 he published the Caerte van Oostland, a handbook based on both personal observations and reports from sailors that mapped the sailing route from Amsterdam to the Baltic, and which discussed the instruments and methods for surveying uncharted waters. During the time he was compiling the Caerte, Cornelis undertook the parallel project of documenting the territory contained within the Dutch borders, and in particular his native city of Amsterdam. A series of pen-and-ink studies - each a small-scale meditation on the topography of Amsterdam - culminated in 1538 in a monumental painted map, for which the municipal government awarded the artist thirty-six gulden, and which received pride of place in that city’s Stadthuis (town hall). That painting, the oldest surviving plan of Amsterdam, fuses the artist’s expertise in survey techniques with his knowledge of the science of perspective. Six years later, Cornelis produced the map on view here, which translates the Stadthuis painting with minor alterations into the woodcut medium. He printed the map using twelve woodblocks, whose assembled sheets comprise an area of more than one square meter. The View of Amsterdam bristles with information about the city at midcentury. It depicts not only moments of civic and religious significance, but also less conspicuous sites such as
bridges.... houses, yards, ports, and walls, many identified with inscriptions and each rendered with the microscopic attention to detail characteristic of Netherlandish painting of the time. Livestock and neatly partitioned swaths of land - the motors of an earlier economy - coexist with wellmaintained roads, canals, and scores of multi-masted ships decked along the Amstel River, signposts pointing to Dutch prosperity. Cornelis’s map provides a window into Amsterdam at a time when modern progress jostled with the city’s late-medieval past. As with its painted predecessor, the city itself is the subject of the image: it is shown virtually without people. A bearded allegorical figure representing Amsterdam perches on a solid mass of clouds in the upper right. Clutching a trident in his left hand and propping the heraldic crest of Amsterdam on his leg, the figure, who closely resembles Neptune (the Roman god of the sea), watches vigilantly over the calm waters that usher a golden age of trade into the city. In the impression exhibited here, Cornelis or an associate has added color washes, which dramatize the effect of shadows cast by clouds, and which inject a local flavor that uncolored versions of the View could not, as in the use of red pigment on the tiled roofs and brick buildings. The View of Amsterdam achieved immediate success and was reprinted well into the seventeenth century. Circulated and collected widely, this map advertises not only Amsterdam’s advances in scientific knowledge, but also the prodigious talents of its local artists and its growing commercial prosperity - claims demonstrated, respectively, by the map’s method of construction, its form, and its content.” Quotation from Exh. cat: Prints and the Pursuit of Knowledge in Early Modern Europe. Harvard Art Museums and Block Museum of Art. Ed. by Susan Dackerman. Cambridge/ Mass. 2011, cat. no. 87, pp. 348f.
Rare. We are not aware of any other example coming up for sale in the past 40 years. We are only able to trace one example of the map in the United States. Karrow lists 7 known complete, and two incomplete, examples of the various states of the map. They are as follows:
State II - Universiteit van Amsterdam (lacking upper right sheet).
State III - Bibliotheque Royale, Brussels; Gemeentelijke Archiefdienst, Amsterdam; Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam; Nederlands Scheepvaart Museum, Amsterdam.
State IV - Gemeentelijke Archiefdienst, Amsterdam; Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam (lacking lower right sheet); Rijksuniversiteit Leiden; Minneapolis Institute of Arts.
State V - Koninklijk Oudheidkundig Genootschap, Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam.
Jerusalem
HOLLAR, Wenceslaus
Jerusalem.
Publication ?[Cambridge, Field, 1660].
Description
Engraved view with one inset plan, on four sheets.
Dimensions
440 by 2030mm (17.25 by 80 inches).
References
NHG Hollar 1732 I; Pennington 1130.
£10,000
An exceptionally fine impression of Hollar’s panorama of Jerusalem.
Wenceslaus Hollar contributed engraved plates to numerous Bibles, showing religious and ancient artefacts, scenes, views, plans and maps. Many of these were drawn after Juan Batista Villalpando whose seminal work on the Holy Land at the beginning of the seventeenth century influenced generations of scholars, architects and artists. Although Villalpando was accused of heresy for misinterpreting scripture, eventually being found innocent by the Spanish Inquisition, his Biblical cartography and imagery had a great impact on the architecture and construction of later monasteries, churches and even wider urban spaces.
The main image on the present print is a magnificent view of Jerusalem, encompassing the great city walls, the countless small and large buildings within it, and the surrounding hills. The river valley in the foreground is cultivated with trees and fields, while within the walls the city appears to be constructed according to a grid-like system, dominated by the Temple atop Mount Moriah at the centre of the view. Hollar included a numerical key in the upper right-hand corner of his plan to identify Jerusalem’s various structures, spaces and sites, which are further examined in an aerial inset plan in the opposite corner.
Oriented to the west, the inset plan show the entirety of the city as well as those parts of the surrounding area that contained sites and buildings of religious or historic importance. In fact, the number of sites shown outside of the city walls exceeds that within, since only the most important monuments, structures and places inside Jerusalem are shown, unobscured by the mass of nameless buildings that appeared on many contemporary views. Among the sites that do appear are the palace of Herod, the Hippdrome and, of course, the Temple of Solomon, which naturally bears a close resemblance to the more detailed illustrations found in Villalpando’s ‘in Ezechielem Explanationes’, which Hollar also replicated. The relief and layout of the surrounding area are represented pictorially, as are its important locations, such as the Mount of Olives, the Garden of Gethsemane and the Camp of Pompey, which was set up during the seige of 63 BC. The Kidron Brook runs north to south along the eastern walls of the city, and further to the east, beyond the Mount of Olives, the neighbouring town of Bethany is represented as a modest collection of buildings.
STALPAERT, Daniel
Platte-Grondt van de Oude en Nieuwe Royinge der Stat Amsterdam.
Publication
Amsterdam, Johannes Covens and Cornelis Mortier, 1662 [but c1730].
Description
Large engraved wall map on six sheets joined, mounted on linen, edged in green silk, light wear to old folds.
Dimensions
1230 by 1615mm (48.5 by 63.5 inches).
£20,000
The Golden Age of the Dutch Republic
Rare wall map of Amsterdam by the States’ architect Daniel Stalpaert (1615-1676), flanked by the arms of the city and the principal families, commissioned by the city, under the guidance of a committee that included Johannes Blaeu, with a list of dedicatees, the city councillors, along the lower border.
The plan shows Amsterdam at the height of her powers, with the great Three Canals Project nearing completion. The Project, which was begun in 1610, was brought about by the rapid growth in the city’s population. The population had doubled between 1567 and 1610 to 50,000, and would by 1660 have quadrupled to 200,000. In order to cope with the ballooning population, the city council implemented the construction of three great semicircular canals, the erection of buildings on pilings, sanitary arrangements for each house, a network of drains and sewers, and the construction of merchants’ houses with storage facilities on the upper floors and warehouses near the mouth of the Amstel. The council expropriated the land, dug the canals, and laid out lots for sale to private individuals for housing, thus allowing some of the cost of construction to be recouped. At the end of the project Amsterdam had expanded from 450 to 1,800 acres.
UGHI, Lodovico
Iconografica Rappresentazione
della Inclita Città di Venezia Consacrata al Reggio Serenissimo Domino Veneto.
Publication
Venice, Ludovico Furlanetto Sopra el Ponte dé Baretteri, [c1739].
Description
Large engraved wall map on eight sheets, title to banner at top, 16 views of Venice to left and right borders, text below.
Dimensions 1497 by 2055mm. (59 by 81 inches).
References Susan Filter, ‘Historic Intent: Lodovico Ughi’s Topographical Map of Venice; A Large Wall Map as an Historic Document, a Work of Art, and a Material Artifact’, ‘The Book and Paper Group Annual’ 13 (1994); Moretto, 152.
£85,000
Venice - Queen of the Adriatic
One of the largest maps of Venice ever published, and the first map of the city based upon accurate field surveys. Lodovico Ughi’s topographical map is a landmark in the cartographic history of Venice. Successive Venetian mapmakers in general did not significantly alter the appearance of the city: among the exceptions is Ughi’s work. Not only is it one of the largest printed plans of Venice, but it also served for centuries as a model for subsequent maps.
At the sides are 16 views: the Piazza San Marco, the Doge’s Palace, the Basilica di San Marco, the Arsenal, the Rialto Bridge, the church of San Giorgio Maggiore, the church of Santissimo Redentore, and the church of Santa Maria della Salute. The views have been tentatively assigned to the Venetian artist and engraver Francesco Zucchi (1692-1764), made after Luca Carlevarij’s ‘Fabriche e Vedute di Venetia’, published in 1703.
To the lower left is the coat of arms of Francesco Morosini, surrounded by putti and military equipment. Francesco Morosini (1619-1694) was the last of the “warrior Doges”. He is most famed for his victories over the Ottomans during the Morean War (1684-1699), in which he captured most of the Morea. For this he was awarded the honorary title “Peloponnesiacus”, and was the first Venetian citizen to have a bronze bust placed during his own lifetime in the Great Hall.
To the upper right is a personification of Venice with the lion of Saint Mark at her feet, surrounded by marine creatures representing her marriage to the sea and the riches she derives from it. The image is taken from a drawing by the Venetian painter Sebastiano Ricci (1659 - 1734). The cartouche at the bottom right holds a dedication written by Lodovico Ughi Alvise Mocenigo, the Doge in 1729. He calls the city “blessed by the Virgin, divine, Queen of the Adriatic, always envied, a constant sustainer of the Catholic religion, known throughout the world for her justice, feared by her enemies, defended in all times by her sons who have sacrificed their lives”. Below the map is a long text panel providing information about Venice.
Examples are held at the Bibliothèque Nationale de France; Houghton Library, Harvard; Zentralbibliothek Zurich (map only); Leiden University Library; and Dresden University Library.
[BRETEZ, Louis] and [TURGOT, Michel-Etienne]
[Plan de Paris].
Publication Paris, 1739.
Description
First edition, folio (560 by 450mm), folding key sheet, 20 double-page engraved maps, plates 18 and 19 joined, numerous plans, maps, views and cameos pasted to verso of each sheet, full calf, fillet border, spine rebacked preserving original gilt decoration.
Dimensions
550 by 840mm (21.75 by 33 inches).
References Millard 39.
£30,000
Turgot’s monumental plan of Paris
Turgot’s fine plan of Paris during the reign of Louis XV, which, if joined, would measure some 2360 by 2400mm.
In 1734 Michel-Étienne Turgot (1690-1751), Mayor of Paris, decided to promote the reputation of Paris to Parisian, provincial and foreign elites by implementing a new plan of the city. He asked Louis Bretez, a member of the Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture, and professor of perspective, to draw up the plan of Paris and its suburbs.
Louis Bretez began his work in 1734, and was given permission by Turgot to enter all the mansions, houses and gardens in Paris, in order to gain accurate measurements and drawings. The endeavour would take two years.
Turgot depicts Paris in isometric projection, a slightly more scientifically rigourous example of the seventeenth century birds-eye view. This was somewhat against the grain of cartographic thinking at the time, with many cartographers abandoning the visually appeal birds-eye view, for the more scientifically accurate geometric plan.
In 1736, Claude Lucas, engraver of the Royal Academy of Sciences, engraved the 21 copper sheets of the plan. The plan was published in 1739, and the prints were bound in volumes offered to the King, the members of the Academy, and the Municipality. Additional copies were to serve as representations of France to foreigners.
This particular example is copiously extra-illustrated with eighteenth and nineteenth century maps of France and its regions, vignette views of Paris, and portraits of notable seventeenth and eighteenth century French men and women.
ROCQUE, John
A Plan of the Cities of London and Westminster and Borough of Southwark, with the contiguous Buildings. From an Actual Survey taken by John Rocque, Land Surveyor and engraved by John Pine.
Publication London, John Pine and John Tinney, 1746.
Description Engraved plan on 24 sheets.
Dimensions 2100 by 4000mm (82.75 by 157.5 inches).
References Howgego 96 (1).
£100,000
John Rocque’s magnificent map of early Georgian London
It would appear that John Rocque, a French Huguenot, emigrated with the rest of his family to London in the 1730s, where he began to ply his trade as a surveyor of gentleman’s estates, and with plans of Kensington Gardens, and Hampton Court. However, in 1737 he applied his surveying skills to a much great task, that of surveying the entire built-up area of London. Begun in the March of 1737, upon a scale of 26 inches to 1 statute mile, the map would take nine years to produce, eventually being engraved upon 24 sheets of copper and published in 1746. The plan stretches west to east from Hyde Park to Limehouse and north to south from New River Head to Walworth.
[MAKHAEV, Mikhail Ivanovich, TRUSKOTT, I.F., SOKOLOV, I. and others]
Plan de la Ville de St. Petersbourg avec ses Principales Vües dessiné & gravé sous la direction de l’Academie Imperiale des Sciences & des Arts. [Title also in Cyrillic: Plan stolichnago goroda Sanktpeterburga : Map of the capital city Saint Petersburg showing the main avenues].
Publication St Petersbourg, Petersburg Academy of Sciences 1753.
Description
Large wall map on nine engraved sheets, with sheet seven reproduced in printed heliogravure facsimile.
Dimensions 1415 by 2065mm (55.75 by 81.25 inches).
References SK 5346 and 5347; cf. Obol’ianinov 2048.
14711
£40,000
Makhaev’s map of St Petersburg “to the glory and honour of the Russian Empire”
Makhaev’s extraordinary large-scale map of St. Petersburg; one of the masterpieces of Russian engraving art.
Published in limited numbers to mark the first jubilee of the city in 1753, and dedicated “to the glory and honour of the Russian Empire” Markhaev’s map was commissioned to commemorate the city’s remarkable growth in the 50 years since its foundation.
The extraordinary map is on a scale of 1:3350 and gives an accurate view of the existing streets, palaces and public buildings of the city, as well as prospective building projects. The decoration includes the Arms of the City, and attributes of the sciences, arts, commerce, and the art of war at the top right. The majority of the design was by Makhaev and so, correctly, his name is usually attributed to the whole work. However, numerous artists contributed to the views and panoramas, and the map itself was prepared at the Geographic Department of the Academy of Sciences and supervised by the junior scientific assistant I.F. Truskott. under the guidance of I. Sokolov, who also engraved the figure of the Empress Elisabeth Petrovna after a portrait by Louis Caravaque.
Only 100 prints were taken and were distributed amongst major library and palace collections in Europe. This small production run, together with the high mortality rate associated with large-scale wall maps, means that the map is now extremely rare.
BRETEUIL, Louis Charles Auguste le Tonnelier, baron de
Vüe de Rio de Janeiro [together with] Plan de la Baye de Rio Janeiro et de ses Deffense, 1757.
Publication [1757].
Description
Manuscript plan of the bay of Rio de Janeiro in pen and ink with wash, signed “Breteuil fecit” [together with] a pen and ink prospect of Rio de Janeiro, both dissected and mounted on canvas.
Dimensions
View: 290 by 790mm (11.5 by 31 inches); Plan: 535 by 735mm (21 by 29 inches).
References Pedro Corrêa da Lago, Brasiliana Itau (São Paulo: Capivara, 2009); Thomas Arthur de Lally, Memoirs of Count Lally, (London, 1766), 183.
£89,700
A plan of Rio de Janeiro by the Comte de Breteuil, the last prime minister of pre-revolutionary France, together with one of the earliest manuscript prospects of the city
A detailed map of Rio de Janeiro made in 1757 by the Comte (later Baron) de Breteuil, together with a prospect of the city, sacked by a French corsair in 1711.
Louis Charles Auguste le Tonnelier, baron de Breteuil, baron de Preuilly (1730-1807) was a French aristocrat, diplomat and statesman. He was the last Prime Minister of France to serve under the Bourbon monarchy, appointed by Louis XVI only 100 hours before the storming of the Bastille.
Breteuil was born in 1730 at the château of Azay-le-Ferron into a well-connected aristocratic family. He was educated in Paris before joining the army, where he served under Thomas Arthur, comte de Lally, baron de Tollendal (1702-1766) in his ill-fated command of the French forces in India during the Seven Years’ War against England. With orders to join the French forces in India, Lally and Breteuil sailed from France on 2 May 1757 under the command of Vice Admiral Anne Antoine, Comte d’Aché (1701-1780). During the voyage, an epidemic forced the fleet to put in at Rio de Janeiro for six weeks. The Portuguese, neutral in the conflict between France and England, initially refused access to the city. This, quite possibly, was a result of the fact that the French had sacked Rio in 1711 under René Du Guay-Trouin, a former corsair who took the supposedly impregnable city with a force half the size of the defending garrison. It is likely that the present plan and prospect were drawn up during this hiatus, perhaps in contemplation of emulating Du Guay-Trouin’s previous exploits. Indeed, the text states that the map is based upon a plan made during the expedition of “Mr Duguay”, together with corrections. It also indicates that the plan was made in conjunction with a prospect of the city (presumably the accompanying view offered here) and states that the plan and its companion view may be relied upon as accurate.
The plan is titled ‘Plan of the Rio de Janeiro Bay and its Defenses’, and is signed in at the bottom right “Breteuil fecit”. A manuscript legend towards the right of the plan lists the following:
1. The City; 2 The Benedictines; 3. Fort St Sebastien; 4. The Parish City; 5. The Jesuits; 6. The Franciscans; 7. The aqueduct; 8. Fort Mercy; 9. Island of the goats and snakes; 10. Bishop’s residence; 11. Fort Conception; 12. Aqueduct; 13. Submerged sand bank; 14. Island and fort of the city of Gagnon; 15. The harbour; 16. Island and Fort Delage; 17. Fort St Jean; 18. Fort St Theodore; 19. Fort Santa Cruz; 20. Battery Delapre Vermek; 21. Submerged sand bank; 22. Chapel and Battery of Notredame of her travels; 23. Battery; 24. Oil Manufacture of Baleine Pt Leroy.
The prospect, or view, is itself inscribed “realised for the Comte de Breteuil”, thereby reinforcing the pairing of the two images, and the text towards the lower right of the image remarks: “This Bay has 8 deep- water anchorages. Two link the Fort Santa Cruz to Rio de Janeiro. Our troops and our crew are camped in San Domingo, which faces that city. This
view is busy with our vessels. The parts that went imperfectly have been corrected while travelling through the Bay, placing here objects that perspective wouldn’t admit.”
Inside a large text box at the lower right, the following are identified:
A. The City B. Government C. Public Fountain D. Small Vessel in Construction E. [Orphanage] “Mercy to the Found Children” F. Fort of Mercy G. Jesuits H. Fort St Sebastian J. Island ovf the Goats K. Fort of the Conception and Levesche L. Anchorage of the Portuguese Fleet M. Old Parish N. College O. Aqueduct P. Customs Q. St Claire R. Notre Dame de Gloire S. Batterie Theodore T. Battery St Jean V. Fort X. Fort Villegayen Y. Island and Fort of Laage Z. Vessel greeting the Fort n1 Fort Santa Cruz n2 The six vessels of the French fleet.
Correa do Lago includes a chapter dedicated to drawings and watercolours in his catalogue of the collection of Olavo Setubal. In this he describes a 1760 prospect of the city by Blasco (‘Propescto da cidade do Rio de Janeiro vista da parte norte da Ilha das Cobras’) as “the most detailed and complete panorama of the eighteenth century”. The present drawing predates Blasco’s work by some three years. The next oldest prospect in the Setubal collection is dated 1795. Furthermore, no comparable prospect can be found in the Coleção Brasiliana Fundação Estudar (part of the Oscar Americano collection).
Provenance
Bibliothèque des ducs de Luynes, Château de Dampierre, France.
ESPINOSA de los Monteros y Abadía, Antonio
Plano topográphico de la Villa y Corte de Madrid.
Publication Madrid, 1769.
Description
Large engraved plan on nine sheets, letterpress text pasted onto the lower sheets, remnants of original colour, losses to margins. A full condition report is available upon request.
Dimensions 1850 by 2465mm (72.75 by 97 inches).
References
De los Reyes Gómez, ‘El impresor Antonio Espinosa de los Monteros en Madrid: avance para su estudio’, Revista General de Información y Documentación, 14, 2004; Molina Campuzano, Instituto de Estudios de Administración Local, ed. Planos de Madrid de los siglos XVII y XVIII, 1960; Ortega Vidal, ‘Los planos históricos de Madrid y su fiabilidad topográfica’. Catastro. ‘Ciclo de Conferencias con motivo del 250 Aniversario de la Planimetría General de Madrid 1749- 1999, 2000.
£40,000
The first plan of Madrid to show the eight quarters in which the city had been divided a year prior; the first to include the numbering of building blocks; and the first to show the orientation and plans of churches. It was published during the reign of Charles III under the direction of one of his most prominent government reformers, the Count of Aranda, following an extensive urban transformation aimed at aligning Madrid with the other European capitals.
In the mid-eighteenth century Madrid counted a population of 150,000 and over 7,500 houses. The city was characterized by the pronounced unevenness of the ground and large areas of crop land, and its core was formed by a network of narrow and poorly illuminated streets, which hindered the implementation of hygiene measures and facilitated criminality. The king (Ferdinand VI) therefore commissioned a survey, known as the ‘Visita General’, with the purpose of reorganizing the city administratively and urbanely and, most important, to establish the correct taxation for each household. The survey was assigned to four architects who with their teams visited and numbered every building, and drew plans of every street, resulting in a general planimetry composed of 557 maps.
The plan is set within lavish ornamentation in the style of Piranesi. It stretches from the Manzanares river and the Royal Palace on the left, to the renewed Paseo de San Jerónimo and Parque del Retiro on the right, giving ample room to this eastern part of the city. An inset map shows the old Paseo de San Jerónimo before it was demolished and altered by order of the Count of Aranda. Marked in black near the Plaza Mayor are the ancient Muslim walls, reflecting the growing interest in archaeology. On the lower register are letterpress texts describing the history of Madrid, listing hospitals, churches and convents, and the subdivision of the quarters and their barrios. Some details, such as the square in front of the Royal Palace, were never actually implemented.
Antonio Espinosa de los Monteros y Abadía (1732-1812), was one of the most important engravers of his time. He spent three years in Rome before training at the Real Academia de San Fernando in Madrid, where he became a fellow. He was engraver at the Mints of Seville and Segovia, opened printing presses in Segovia and Madrid, with the present plan being his most ambitious project. It has been suggested that Espinosa might have not been the sole author of the plan, and that a likely candidate could have been the architect and military engineer José de Hermosilla y Sandoval (1715-1776), who was involved in the projects of the Prado, the hospital in Atocha and the church of San Francisco el Grande, which are all drawn with a great level of detail on the plan. Further to this, it is possible that the basis for the present map would have been Pedro Teixeira Albernaz’ plan of 1656, the two sharing similar size, scale, and orientation. Rare. We were able to locate seven institutional copies: Biblioteca Nacional de España (3); Bibliothèque nationale de France; British Library; University of Connecticut Library; University of Toronto Library. We were unable to trace another copy appearing on the market in the last 50 years.
RATZER, Bernard
To his Excellency Sir Henry Moore Bart. Captain General and Governour… This plan of the city of New York is most Humbly Inscribed by…Bernd. Ratzen.
Publication 1769.
Description Engraved map printed on two sheets, joined, a few marginal nicks and tears, some dust-soiling.
Dimensions
580 by 840mm (22.75 by 33 inches).
References Deak, ‘Picturing America, 120; Cohen & Augustyn, ‘Manhattan in Maps’, pps. 73-77; Haskell, ‘Manhattan Maps’, 319; Stokes, ‘Iconography of Manhattan Island’, Vol. I, pl. 42; Cumming, ‘The Montresor-RatzerSauthier Sequence of Maps of New York City’, ‘Imago Mundi’, 31, pp. 55-65. 34074
£0.00
Rare first state of the “Ratzen plan” of New York
The extremely rare first state of one of the most important colonial maps of New York City.
“Made just prior to the Revolution, the Ratzer plan is the most accurate an useful survey of New York then circulating” (Deak).
The map is usually referred to as the “Ratzen Plan” due to the misspelling of the mapmaker’s name in the title. It was the work of Bernard Ratzer, British engineer, and was a result of the Stamp Act Riots of 1765. Fearing that the city might soon become a battleground, and needing detailed information about its layout, the British authorities commissioned Ratzer to survey and construct a map of the city.
The manuscript was completed in 1767, and very few examples of this first state were printed in 1769. It lacks a publisher’s imprint and date, and was probably prepared primarily for circulation within the British Administration. This must account for its great rarity. Nevertheless, it was advertised for public sale in the New York Gazette, 21 August 1769. Another copy of the first state can be found in the Stokes Collection, New York Public Library. A second state, with the imprint of Thomas Jefferys, Jr. and William Faden, was published in January 1776, at the beginning of the American Revolution. Almost all surviving copies of the map are in the second state.
While this map focuses on the developed part of the city, at the tip of Manhattan Island, Ratzer also prepared an even larger map that shows both the city and its environs. It is usually referred to as the “Ratzer map” (see item 14). This second map was first published in 1770, and republished in 1776. In referring to these two maps, Cohen & Augustyn state that they are perhaps the finest of an American city produced in the eighteenth century. The “geographical precision combined with its highly artistic engraving was unsurpassed in the urban cartography of its day”. The topography and renderings of estates and farmlands on the Ratzen plan are given with such fine detail that it makes clear what a small town New York was before the Revolution. A key beneath the title identifies 31 important sites. The landmarks and property lines are reported with such accuracy that the map is sometimes used to settle title disputes to this day.
Stokes called it quite simply “the most accurate and reliable map which we have of New York at this period”, and Cumming praises Ratzer as “an experienced surveyor and fine draftsman”.
CARLETTI, Niccolò
Mappa Topografica della Città di Napoli e de’ suoi Contorni.
Publication Naples, Carletti, [c1770].
Description
Folio atlas (547 by 425 mm), engraved map on 35 sheets, half calf over brown marbled paper boards.
Dimensions (each sheet) 364 by 532mm. (14.25 by 21 inches); (if joined) 2376 by 5016mm (93.5 by 197.5 inches).
20112
£45,000
Carletti’s magnificent plan of Naples
In his ‘Lettera ad un amico’ (‘Letter to a friend’) of 1750, Giovanni Carafa, Duca di Noja, had implored the municipal government of Naples to create a new map of the city “as the only way to render illustrious the sumptuous public works of our glorious monarch, which are the first fruits of the return of Naples to its ancient state of a metropolis”, Charles the Bourbon, otherwise known as the King of Naples and Sicily, Charles VII and V (1734-1759). Charles had instigated a landmark cadastral survey of the Kingdom, in 1740.
The municipality agreed with Carafa, and he and land-surveyor Antonio Francesco “Vanti” created a manuscript plan. However, the magnitude of the project and Carafa’s numerous other interests meant that when he died, in 1768, nothing very definitive had been achieved. Giovanni Pignatelli, Principe di Monteroduni, took on the commission. He employed local professor of architecture Niccolò Carletti to make revisions to Carafa and Vanti’s plan, and to compile the extensive annotated list of ancient and modern sites in and around Naples, which accompany it, the ‘Spiegazione storiografa...’.
Giuseppe Aloja was employed as sole engraver. In addition to the ‘Mappa topografica...’ itself, and the neo-classical decorations, a panoramic view of the coast from the Ponte della Maddalena in the east to the island of Ischia in the west, the ‘Veduta scenografica a ponente della Citta di Napoli in Campagna Felice’ appears. In it, a number of Naples’s most prominent landmarks are featured: the Albergo dei Poveri, Europe’s largest poorhouse; the Royal Residence at Capodimonte; the steeple of the Church of the Carmine; the cuppola of the cathedral; and its many castles and villas. The result conveys “a sense of extraordinary urban density, depicting extramonumental Naples as a streetless mass of impenetrable structures,... an urban breadth” (Naddeo), synonymous with the idea of Naples as “metropolis”. By the time the map was eventually published, 20 years after Carafa’s proposal, Charles the Bourbon had become King of Spain, as Charles III (1759-1788), bequeathing the duel crowns of Naples and Sicily to his son, Ferdinand IV and III. Nevertheless, and ignoring the son, the municipal government went ahead and dedicated the plan to Charles III: Fame, Mercury, and Parthenope (the mythical founder of Naples) swoop down from heaven, bursting through the fabric of the map itself, bearing an ox hide with an encomium to Charles on it. The municipal government congratulate their own civic achievements in as high a fashion. In the upper right-hand corner putti also tear their way through the map, pulling it back to show an heraldic tree symbolizing the genealogy of both the civic parliament of the city of Naples and of the map itself.
SCHLEUEN, Johann David
Die Königl. Residenz Berlin.
Publication Berlin, 1773.
Description Engraved map, dissected and mounted on linen.
Dimensions 812 by 895mm
£15,000
The Capital of Prussia
A fine and detailed plan of eighteenth century Berlin.
Berlin was made capital of the Kingdom of Prussia in 1701 and in 1709 the city was merged with the historic town of Cölln and the suburbs of Dorotheenstradt, Friedrichs-werder and Friedrichstadt to form the “Royal Capital and Residence City” of Frederick I. The King enlarged the army and made the city a major garrison, creating new squares and avenues to serve as military parade-grounds. The city had now become a major European capital, fit to compete with the rest.
The plan is based upon Samuel von Schmettau’s map of 1748. Schleuen has augmented it with the latest urban developments, shown the demolition of the seventeenth century fortifications, and added the prospects of the city’s most important buildings. In the lower half are four inset maps of Berlin through the ages, by Merian, Schultz, Faltz and Dusableau.
Rare. The first edition of the map was published in 1753-54, with a second edition, as present, appearing in 1773. Copac records only one institutional example of the first edition, kept at the British Library.
RATZER, Bernard
Plan of the City of New York, in North America surveyed in the Years 1766 & 1767.
Publication
London, Publishd according to Act of Parliament Jany. 12, 1776: by Jefferys & Faden, Corner of St. Martins Lane, Charing Cross, 1776.
Description
Large engraved map, on 3 sheets joined, dissected and mounted on linen.
Dimensions 1225 by 905mm (48.25 by 35.75 inches).
References
Cohen and Augustyn Manhattan in Maps pp.73-77; Cumming, “The MontresorRatzer-Sauthier Sequence of Maps of New York City, 1766-76” in Imago Mundi Vol. 31 (1979), pp. 55-65.
Inventory reference 22020
£240,000
“one of the most beautiful, important, and accurate early plans of New York” (Stokes)
“Perhaps the finest map of an American city and its environs produced in the eighteenth century” (Augustyn).
This superb and elegant map takes in the southern end of Manhattan island, as far north as 50th Street today, the marshy New Jersey shores of the Hudson, Kennedy, Bucking and Governors Islands, and parts of present day Brooklyn along the East River. It shows the city of about 25,000 people, surrounded by countryside that includes much of Manhattan and Brooklyn. The view at the bottom, “A South West View of the City of New York, Taken from the Governours Island at *” is after a watercolor by Captain-Lieutenant Thomas Davis. The title and list of references appears within a rococo cartouche lower left, the dedication to Sir Henry Moore, the Governor of New York, in another upper left, a scale lower right.
The map is the ultimate culmination of Ratzer’s surveys of 1766 and 1767. The first map generated by those surveys, his “Ratzen” plan of just the city, was sent back to London and engraved by Thomas Kitchen, Hydrographer to the Duke of York and later the King, and published in 1769, with Ratzer’s name misspelled. By about 1770 a more extensive plan of the city and its environs was completed and published undated by Kitchin. The present map was published, unchanged, by Jefferys and Faden, although it was rarely included in Faden’s “North American Atlas” of 1777, and the map remains exceptionally rare.
Bernard Ratzer served in the British Army in the 60th or American regiment, surveying the east coast of North America during the French and Indian War and later the Revolutionary War. His earliest known map is a manuscript chart of Passamquoddy Bay in Maine in 1756. Various other manuscript plans of forts followed, and he collaborated with Sauthier on his survey of New York, published in 1776. In 1769 Sir Henry Moore gave him the task of surveying the New York - NewJersey border.
Ratzer’s map is a significant improvement his earlier plan: the wharves along the Sound are shown and the streets given names, new buildings and streets on either side of the Bowery are entered, and Ratzer has included careful topographical surveys of the eastern tip of long island adjacent to ‘The Sound or East River’. ”The Methodist Meeting House, not completed until 1768, is identified, and the scale has been reduced by half – 800 feet to one inch. The enlarged area extends north to approximately present 42nd street, and the New Jersey Shore and Long Island bordering the East River are included. The cultivated fields, roads, buildings, and names of chief property owners are shown in remarkable detail” (Cumming).
[DOIN, Ochikochi (i.e. Fujii HANCHI), after]
Bunken Edo oezu. [Survey of the districts of Greater Edo].
Publication
Edo, Suharaya Mohe, c.1803.
Description
Large folding woodblock map, with stencilled colour.
Dimensions
1635 by 1965mm (64.25 by 77.25 inches).
£20,000
The dawning of the age of Bunka-Bunsei
Oriented with west to the top, Suharaya Mohe’s large map of greater Edo, now Tokyo (from 1868), has its origins in the city plan of “Ochikochi Doin”, actually the surveyor Fujii Hanchi, first issued in 1671, and augmented several times over many years. However, a map with the title ‘Bunken Edo oezu’, as here, was first issued by Suwara Jiemon, in 1727, also subsequently revised several times until 1778, when the Kanamaru publishing house issued their own map with this same title.
Suharaya Mohē’s (1731-1782) revised version is a beautiful and highly detailed map of the city at the heart of the Tokugawa shogunate (1603-1868) empire, at the turn of the nineteenth century, and the dawn of a new era in Japanese culture. Right at the centre of the map, where the Edo Castle should be, is a blank space. Ostensibly for security reasons, this affectation also attempted to add an aura of mystique to the seat of Tokugawa power, and the ruling shogun himself, Ienari (1773-1841). Ienari’s administration (1787 to 1837) followed one of great austerity, and this period of his rule became known as the Bunka-Bunsei (Culture - Benevolent Government) period (1804-1829). As is amply reflected in this map, this was a period of increasing urbanisation, which saw the rise of an extravagant merchant class, a proliferation of lavish spending, subsequent financial insecurity, and inevitable corruption. In turn, this would lead to the eventual unravelling of the shogunate’s rigid feudal system, and an end to Japan’s isolationist policy, which had hitherto limited contact and trade with the outside world.
Nevertheless, the map also reflects the continuing demands of the shogunate’s Sankin-kotai policy that required the most powerful lords, the daimyo, to live every other year in Edo, highlighting their residences, other private properties, temples, and marketplaces. The large legend at the left of the map outlines much of this information, as well as adding information on pilgrimage routes, distances from Edo’s logistical centre at Nihonbashi (the Japan Bridge), constellations, and lucky and unlucky days.
A map of Napoleonic Milan
[ASTRONOMI DI BRERA]
Pianta della città di Milano [Plan of the city of Milan].
Antonello (2014) ‘Bonaparte and the astronomers of Brera Observatory’, Cornell University; Buzzi (2005) ‘Le vie di Milano: dizionario della toponomastica milanese’, Hoepli Editore; Catizzone (2009) ‘Un tesoro ritrovato: Dal rilievo alla rappresentazione’, Gangemi.
15892
£10,000
One of the earliest ‘modern’ maps of Milan, published at the very end of Napoleonic rule in northern Italy.
From 1796 to 1814, the modern regions of Lombardy, Veneto, Emilia-Romagna, Friuli Venezia Giulia, Trentino, South Tyrol and Marche were collectively ruled by France under Napoleon Bonaparte’s Kingdom of Italy. Milan was the state capital, and the Palazzo Brera its main cultural centre, housing the gallery of the national Academy, a museum of antiquities, a botanical garden, an extensive library and an observatory. Napoleon was intent on making it a learned establishment of global importance; in fact, one of his earliest actions after setting up his new government in Milan was to meet with Barnaba Oriani, the unofficial head of the Brera Observatory.
Perhaps to reaffirm its control over the Kingdom, the Napoleonic regime commissioned new maps of its territories, declaring the existing material insufficient and demanding that the newly unified provinces be shown collectively. The Brera Observatory was supplied with new instruments and charged with surveying the Duchy of Milan. The initial attempt in 1804 was disastrous, with the majority of the surveyors falling ill, one drowning in a river and the leader dying from excessive labour. Yet in 1807, the astronomers finally produced a plan of the city, which is widely considered the first modern map of Milan. It is entitled ‘Pianta di Milano. Capitale del Regno d’Italia’ (‘Plan of Milan. Capital of the Kingdom of Italy’).
The only surviving copy of the map is held in the Milan State Archives, having been rediscovered and restored in 2007. The present map, however, is almost identical in cartography, and was also produced by the astronomers of the Brera Observatory. It is dated to 2 January 1814 and bears the title ‘Pianta della città di Milano’ (Plan of the city of Milan). There are a few minor distinctions in the topography of the 1807 and 1814 maps which reflect the political developments in Milan. The Villa Bonaparte and the Contrada Bonaparte notably lose their references to the French leader, the former becoming “Villa Reale” and the latter the “Strada Risara”. The defeats faced by Napoleon’s army in 1813 pointed towards his inevitable fall from European dominance, and indeed he would abdicate his rule in April of the following year, officially releasing his Italian territories on 30th May 1814. The changes in this map, published only four months earlier, mirror the decline of French influence over Italy, and in particular, Milan.
Nonetheless, the plan is consistent in depicting the same roads, buildings and squares as shown on the earlier plan. It is incredibly detailed, with house numbers and names listed, and the interior of certain buildings and gardens pictorially illustrated. An index on the left gives the names of the streets, alleyways, buildings and piazzas presented on the map, while to the right there is text explaining some important information about the topography of the city, including its height above sea level and the circumference of its walls. Of particular note is the Sforza Castle in
the upper left corner, which had been remodelled under the Napoleonic regime with the addition of the piazza castello, and is shown surrounded by the tree-lined Forum and the immense Cavalry Barracks.
The present map is extremely rare. We have been able to trace only four institutional examples worldwide, held at The British Library, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, University of Illinois, and Universitäts- und Landesbibliothek Darmstadt. Furthermore, we have only been able to trace one other example appearing at auction.
HOBURG,
Maryanne Regal
Silicon Valley.
Publication
Silicon Valley. City Graphics of America, P.O. Box 261, Fremont, California, 94537, Price $3.95 1982.
Description Colour printed pictorial map.
Dimensions
390 by 510mm (15.25 by 20 inches).
£28,000
Foundation map of Silicon Valley - inscribed by the artist
First issue, pre-publication state, of this first map of Silicon Valley, inscribed by the artist. With “Decathelon” Club misspelled, which is ironic, given that it is spelled correctly in at least two other places on the map: a teacher near the center of the lower edge asks her pupils “to spell decathlon”; and the track where “Bruce Jenner trained for the decathlon” is shown. The latter is one of the many suggested captions for the published issue, present in this map in a form of overprinting. In this printing the zip code is given as 94537.
Hoburg famously took her camera, drove around the burgeoning community of technical companies, sketched what she saw, and created what would be recognised as the foundation map of Silicon Valley: providing a fascinating snapshot into the early days of the tech boom in California, and the map is filled with the logos and buildings of software and computer companies. Some of the companies shown have survived, and are now household names: IBM, Toshiba, and Hewlett Packard. At the lower edge is the distinctive original rainbow logo of what is arguably now the most famous software company in the world, Apple. The map also shows some of the victims of the failure of the market. Atari, at the upper right, would fold in 1984, following the recession in the video game industry in North America. VisiCorp, in the centre, suffered ongoing legal battles, and is now owned by Paladin. For the companies in the map, however, the risks were worth it to be at the cutting edge of technology.
The map was produced by a small graphic design company, City Graphics of America, who offered local businesses a place on the map for a fee. They would then simplify the urban landscape to make room for the names of the businesses and comic illustrations. The next issue, dated 1983 and printed on the same scale as the current map, not surprisingly includes many more businesses.
We know of no other example of this proof state of the map. The David Rumsey Map Collection includes an example of the published version, and a later edition on a larger scale.
Oblong folio album (245 x 380 mm). 57 ff. 50 full-page pen and ink drawings of imaginary cities and their armies; 50 emblematic cartouches each containing an octave describing the opposite city, some with Latin mottos; dedication in ornamental border; allegorical cartouche with octave praising Venice on the verso. Contemporary red morocco with gilt triple fillets enclosing large oval centerpiece composed of double fllets in arabesque patterns with armorial shield, edges gilt. Stored in custom-made half morocco case.
References Manfredo Tafuri, Venice and the Renaissance (Boston: MIT Press, 1995). Lionello Puppi, Scrittori vicentini d’architettura del secolo XVI (Venice: Accademia Olimpica, 1973).
£0.00
Imaginary Cities
Unique album with splendid manuscript designs for imaginary fortified cities, created for and dedicated to Marino Grimani in the year of his appointment as Doge of the City and Republic of Venice, which he would reign over until his death. Grimani served as Superintendent of Fortresses before becoming Doge and worked for many years on the design and construction of the Palmanova fortress, the greatest of the Renaissance star forts and constantly embattled by the Ottomans as well as by other forces for centuries to come. Vericci’s album constitutes a paragon of Renaissance idealism: a utopian vision which champions the might derived from pushing human genius to the limits of the imagination, combining mathematics, philosophy, and military prowess with art, poetry, and design. Little is known about the author-artist Marco Vericci, some of whose other ingenious military designs survive in the Biblioteca Bertoliana in Vicenza, but he may have worked with Grimani on the designs for Palmanova. Italian art historian Lionello Puppi has cautiously suggested that “Vericcius” may be a pseudonym of Fillipo Pigafetta, a Venetian soldier and mathematician who wrote extensively on military fortifications. In this album, Vericci illustrates and whimsically describes fifty imaginary cities whose designs are based on the utopian mathematical ideals of the Renaissance star fort. The cities, with names like “Mirabella”, “Grimanopoli”, and “Durissima”, are situated in elaborate landscapes (almost all are island fortresses, like their model) and are rendered in exquisite detail. The octave opposite each illustration describes the strengths and virtues of each fantastical fortress in the vein of Italo Calvino’s novel “Invisible Cities” - which also featured a litany of imaginary towns all reflective of La Serenissima herself. The last illustration but one depicts the 1571 Battle of Lepanto, a major naval victory by the Holy League over the Ottomans. The Palmanova fortress was dedicated exactly 22 years, to the day, after the battle - thus its inclusion here links the glory of Lepanto explicitly to the achievements of Doge Grimani, in addition to re-situating this imaginative work in its real-life context of simmering conflict not just between Europe and the Turks, but also between Venice and Austria - her enemy to the North. Some light soiling and spotting; some early marginal repairs where ink has corroded the paper; traces of paste on first two leaves with loss to a few letters. Otherwise in excellent state of preservation and still in its richly gilt morocco binding commissioned for the Doge of Venice (his arms in the centre of the back cover rubbed).
BLAEU, Willem Janszoon
[Pair of nine-inch table globes].
Publication Amsterdam, 1602 [but c1621].
Description
Terrestrial and celestial globes, each with 12 hand-coloured engraved gores heightened in gold, with two polar calottes, over a papier mâché and plaster sphere, rotating on brass pinions within a brass meridian ring with graduated scale, and a graduated brass altitude quadrant, set into a seventeenth century Dutch wooden base with an engraved horizon ring, adumbrating scales, calendar, almanacs etc. With usual defects: paper equinoctial tables present gaps that are filled and restored, small splits along the gores, several partially deleted entries, small scattered spots but in general in good condition for such an early globe pair, modern hour circles and pointers.
Dimensions
Diameter: 230mm (9 inches).
References
Dekker GLB0152, van der Krogt, Globi Neerlandici BLA III; GLB0083 (terrestrial) and GLB0151 (celestial).
£315,000
A pair of table globes by Blaeu
Biography
Willem Janszoon Blaeu (1578-1638) started “one of the most successful publishing houses of the seventeenth century” (Dekker). Originally trained in astronomy, he quickly became a leading maker of maps, atlases and instruments. At the time the Low Countries hosted the best cartographers in Europe, and Blaeu produced ever more accurate and more beautiful globes, spurred by his rivalry with fellow Dutch cartographer and publisher Jodocus Hondius.
Blaeu’s globes were luxury items for wealthy and intellectual merchants and nobility who benefited from Blaeu’s access through the Dutch East India Company to the latest navigational discoveries and geographical information. As van der Krogt observes, “During the preceding century, more than half of the known world, including the entire western hemisphere, had been charted and, more recently, during Blaeu’s own time, large portions of the Pacific were being explored”. Dutch explorers had played a key role in the expanding European worldview: from Olivier van der Noort’s circumnavigation of the earth, to Willem Barentsz’s attempts to find the Northeast Passage. Blaeu also had the advantage of considerable personal technical skill: he studied under the astronomer Tycho Brahe to create a star catalogue for his first celestial globe.
Blaeu’s pair of 230mm (9 inch) table globes are amongst the rarest to survive in comparison with the smaller or larger globes by Blaeu (100, 150, 340 and 680mm; 4, 6 13.5, and 26 inches).
Geography
Willem Jansz Blaeu (1571-1638) collected information that Dutch mariners gathered from around world and brought back to Amsterdam. Crews were instructed to record information about the lands they visited and the skies they saw. Blaeu incorporated these observations in maps and globes. Through his web of contacts and thanks to assiduous research, he was also able to obtain the most recent information about the latest discoveries in the western hemisphere and the South Pacific, where Dutch explorers were particularly active at the time.
Since the globe was published after 1618, Blaeu was able to include the discoveries made by Henry Hudson in his attempt to find a passage to the East Indies. He also included recent Pacific discoveries of the celebrated voyages of Willem Cornelis Schouten and Jacob Le Maire, who both traversed the South Pacific and the Atlantic in 1616. The findings of Schouten and Le Maire in the Tierra del Fuego region are also incorporated.
The Strait of Le Maire is drawn and the hypothetical southern continent is labelled “Terra Australis Incognita Magalanica”. Olivier van Noort’s track is drawn and labelled. His route is indicated with a broken line and the words: “Navigationis Olivierij ductus” (several times). There are various decorative features, such as animals on the different continents, many ships on the high seas and allegorical and mythical figures around the cartouches.
The nine-inch globe is not just a smaller version of the one published in 1599. Drawings of animals and people do often correspond to those on the earlier globe, but Blaeu made several significant changes.
- The west coast of North America is drawn differently and the river system of Brazil is altered.
- The hypothetical southern continent is labelled: Terra Australis Incognita Magalanica.
- There are nine ocean names in handsome curling letters: Mare Congelatum, Mare Atlanticum, Oceanus Aethiopicus, Mare Arabicum et Indicum, Mare di India, Oceanus Chinensis, Mar del Zur, Mare Pacificum, Mar del Nort.
- Willem Blaeu, always eager to display the latest discoveries, traced the route of Van Noort’s route with a broken line. The findings of the voyage of Schouten and Le Maire in the Tierro del Fuego region are included, despite the 1602 date (names: Fr. Le Maire, Mauritius, Staten Landt, C.Hoorn, I.Barneveltij).
Astronomy
The first maker of globes from the northern Netherlands was the cartographer Jacob Floris van Langren (before 1525-1610). He published his first terrestrial and celestial globes in 1586 with a diameter of 325mm (12.75 inches) the terrestrial globes being based on the work of Mercator. The second edition of the celestial globe was improved after the observations of the southern hemisphere by Pieter Dirkz Keyser and Frederik de Houtman were incorporated by the geographer Petrus Plancius (1552- 1622), who was also influential as a globe maker.
Two other famous Dutch mapmakers produced celestial globes: Jodocus Hondius the Elder (1563-1612), one of the most notable engravers of his day, and Willem Jansz Blaeu (1571-1638).
