Rare Maps and Prints
- World & Celestial
- North America
- West Indies, South & Central America
- British Isles
- British Isles
- English counties
- Large-scale
- Bedfordshire
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- Cheshire
- Cornwall
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- Hampshire
- Herefordshire
- Hertfordshire
- Huntingdonshire
- Islands
- Kent
- Lancashire
- Leicestershire
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- Norfolk
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- Northumberland
- Nottinghamshire
- Oxfordshire
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- Suffolk
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- Yorkshire
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- Western Europe
- Eastern Europe
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- Africa
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- Australasia & Pacific
- Decorative Prints
- Title Pages
Mr. Philip D. Burden
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The six larger plates which are engraved to a higher standard are of the world, Europe, France, Germany, the Low Countries, and Italy. Shirley describes the world as a ‘neatly engraved reduction of Ortelius’s first world map.’ They were replaced in 1588 by smaller maps similar in size to the rest of the atlas. Any of the five editions with the larger plates present is highly sought after and of those only this edition contains these larger maps unfolded. Above each of the smaller maps in the atlas is a typographic title with a number which relates to the equivalent map in the folio ‘Theatrum’.
The first edition was an immediate success and was followed in 1579 by a French edition of this pocket-size atlas which is more widely referred to as the ‘Epitome’. They are the only two issues before the atlas was expanded with 11 further maps for further editions in Dutch and French in 1583. This is the first Latin edition and the text, also in verse, was translated by Hugo Favoli (1523-85) from Middelburg, and chief surgeon of Antwerp.
This example is bound with a work derived from the ‘Relationi Universali’ by Giovanni Botero (1540-1617), a priest and geographer. First published without maps in Rome, 1591, it was an edition in Venice, 1596, that first included any maps. In that same year the work was taken up by the Cologne school and issued under various titles. The ‘Amphitheatridion’ as with others, was published by Lambert Andreas (fl. 1590-98). The first two parts describe the Spanish and Turkish Empires, arguably the two most dominant at the time. The ensuing sections describe another twenty kingdoms. It contains a 5 double page maps including a world, Turkish Empire, Europe, Asia and Africa. The world map is attributed to Andreas by Shirley, largely based on a lack of viable alternative evidence. This was issued in the middle of the Austrian and Ottoman Empire wars. Most of the works in the Cologne school are scarce, indeed this one is not cited by Shirley at all. Alden (1980-97) 585/30 & 597/5; Burden (1996) 48; Koeman (1967-70) Ort 51; Van der Krogt (1997-2003) 331:21; Meurer (1988) Bot 3; Nordenskiold (1979) no. 169; Phillips (1909-) 391; Shirley (1984) 132 & 190; Shirley (2004) T.Ort 2d; Tooley’s Dictionary (1999-2004).