A rare early 19th-Century 3-inch diameter English terrestrial pocket globe,, A rare early 19th-Century 3-inch diameter English terrestrial pocket globe,

A rare early 19th-Century 3-inch diameter English terrestrial pocket globe,

Details

A rare early 19th-Century 3-inch diameter English terrestrial pocket globe,
with an overlaid cartouche in the northern Pacific Ocean for JACOB & HALSE LONDON 1809 with the cartography of Lane's pocket globe, made up of twelve hand-coloured engraved gores and two polar calottes, the equatorial graduated in degrees and hours, the Meridian of London ungraduated, the equinoctial colure graduated in degrees, the ecliptic graduated in days of the houses of the Zodiac, the oceans with the tracks of Captain Cook and Admiral Anson, monsoons in the Indian Ocean, the Antipodes of London off New Zealand, near a note for Variable Winds, the continents coloured in yellow, pale orange, pink and green and showing mountains in pictoral relief, rivers, some cities and the Great Wall of China, Antarctica with no land shown, Canada with no northern coastline, Australia labelled NEW HOLLAND, Tasmania labelled Dimens Ld, the former Soviet Union labelled variously INDEPENDENT TARTARY, GR. TARTARY, Eastern Tartary and Moscovy in Asia, northern India labelled MOGULS EMPIRE, eastern Europe showing Moscow in Europe, southern Africa labelled CAFRES and Country of the Hotenots, South America with Columbia labelled TERRA FIRMA and with a note for Gold Mines in Paraguay (some minor rubbing), contained in the original fishskin-covered spherical wooden case, the interior laid with two sets of twelve engraved gores and two polar calottes coloured dark green, the equatorial, ecliptic and four colures all graduated, the constellations depicted by mythical beasts and figures, the case with red-painted rims and three brass hooks and eyes (some splitting to leather and wood, some rubbing to gores)

See Colour Illustrations

Literature

CLIFTON, G., Directory of British Scientific Instrument Makers 1550-1851 (London, 1995)
DEKKER, E., Globes at Greenwich (London, 1999)
STEVENSON, E.L., Terrestrial and Celestial Globes, their History and Construction, vol.II (1921; reprint: London, 1971)
ZÖGNER, L., Die Welt in Händen (Berlin, 1989)

Lot Essay

Nicolas Lane (sometimes erroneously as Nathanial) was, according to Stevenson, "probably an unimportant printer of maps in London". However, he is responsible for some elegant late eighteenth- and early nineteenth century pocket globes, notable for their attractive cartography and strong colouring. Little is known of him: his first globe, of 2¾-inch diameter, appeared in 1776. Dekker reports him as working between 1775 and 1783, stating that in 1783 he was recorded as living in the parish of Christ Church, Southwark, London. Later, 3-inch diameter globes appeared with Lane's name on. The gores on these globes derived originally from those designed and made by James Ferguson (1710-1776), altered and renamed ADAMS London by Dudley Adams (1762-1839), and subsequently reappearing as LANE's Improved Globe. It is unclear whether Lane was alive to issue the early nineteenth century "Lane's Globe"s, or whether his stock of gores was bought, perhaps following his death, reissued and updated, and marketed under Lane's name.

The Schmidt Collection in Vienna contains an example of this globe with the same label from 1809, and a similar Lane globe datable to around the same time. Little more is known of Jacob & Halse; Clifton lists them merely as operating around 1809-1810, and known to have sold globes and sectors.