Details
WIT (Frederick de): ATLAS MAIOR, Amsterdam, F. de Wit, [n.d. but circa 1705].
Folio (540 x 340mm.), 1p. letterpress index, engraved allegorical title by Lauwens Scherm and 152 maps and charts on guards throughout (5 folding, 147 double-page), ALL FINELY COLOURED BY A CONTEMPORARY HAND (title holed and repaired and with margins somewhat frayed, a few maps creased, others with clean tears to folds, most neatly repaired), contemporary blind-stamped vellum, large central ornament enclosing an armillary sphere, yapp-foredges, contained within modern morocco-backed cloth box, ownership inscription 'J.[ames] Bland Trin: Coll: Oxon. S.O.C. 1742.' (covers rubbed and soiled, spine chipped, ties lacking, inner hinges reenforced with linen).
A COMPLETE UNRECORDED ISSUE OF DE WIT'S WORLD ATLAS. The maps include 2 world maps, 29 of Germany, Austria and Switzerland, 10 of Scandinavia, 7 of Great Britain, 19 of the Low Countries, 15 of France, 8 of Italy, 1 of Japan, 4 of the Americas and 27 NAVIGATIONAL CHARTS SHOWING THE MAJOR SEA-ROUTES OF THE 17TH CENTURY. The work of other contemporary cartographers was kept in stock by de Wit and when clients requested maps of areas that he did not publish these were bound in to order: this copy includes a map of the Caribbean by Visscher, 2 American maps by Jaillot (dated 1694), 4 African maps and maps of China and Japan by Blaeu. The dating of the atlas is problematic. The majority of the sheets are watermarked with PV[an der] L[ey] monogram (Heawood 3020 giving a date of 1704), the Jaillot maps date it at not earlier than 1694 and de Wit died in 1706. It is also interesting to speculate that, given the early Oxford ownership inscription, it is a copy ordered through Christopher Browne, the London cartographical publisher. cf.Koeman Wit 18; cf.Phillips 549.
Folio (540 x 340mm.), 1p. letterpress index, engraved allegorical title by Lauwens Scherm and 152 maps and charts on guards throughout (5 folding, 147 double-page), ALL FINELY COLOURED BY A CONTEMPORARY HAND (title holed and repaired and with margins somewhat frayed, a few maps creased, others with clean tears to folds, most neatly repaired), contemporary blind-stamped vellum, large central ornament enclosing an armillary sphere, yapp-foredges, contained within modern morocco-backed cloth box, ownership inscription 'J.[ames] Bland Trin: Coll: Oxon. S.O.C. 1742.' (covers rubbed and soiled, spine chipped, ties lacking, inner hinges reenforced with linen).
A COMPLETE UNRECORDED ISSUE OF DE WIT'S WORLD ATLAS. The maps include 2 world maps, 29 of Germany, Austria and Switzerland, 10 of Scandinavia, 7 of Great Britain, 19 of the Low Countries, 15 of France, 8 of Italy, 1 of Japan, 4 of the Americas and 27 NAVIGATIONAL CHARTS SHOWING THE MAJOR SEA-ROUTES OF THE 17TH CENTURY. The work of other contemporary cartographers was kept in stock by de Wit and when clients requested maps of areas that he did not publish these were bound in to order: this copy includes a map of the Caribbean by Visscher, 2 American maps by Jaillot (dated 1694), 4 African maps and maps of China and Japan by Blaeu. The dating of the atlas is problematic. The majority of the sheets are watermarked with PV[an der] L[ey] monogram (Heawood 3020 giving a date of 1704), the Jaillot maps date it at not earlier than 1694 and de Wit died in 1706. It is also interesting to speculate that, given the early Oxford ownership inscription, it is a copy ordered through Christopher Browne, the London cartographical publisher. cf.Koeman Wit 18; cf.Phillips 549.