A VERY RARE pictorial view of Britain with Scotland receding into the horizon. The description below states that the map ‘shews’ all the ‘Royal Docks, Fortifications, Harbours Sands &c.’. A foreground vignette of shipping occupies the English Channel. It is one of three general maps in George Bickham’s fully engraved ‘British Monarchy’. Of extreme rarity, only seven examples of the atlas are recorded. The maps are highly collected for their distinctiveness. Bickham (1684-1758) was a renowned author and engraver of works on calligraphy. The accompanying descriptive text shows well his skill with script. Provenance: Ingol 1996; private English collection. Chubb (1927) 178; Hodson (1984-97) 217; Lyon (1978); Schrire (1966) no. 29; Shirley (2004) T.Bick 1a; Worms & Baynton-Williams (2011).