America noviter delineata

Cartographer(s): Henricus Hondius
Date: ca. 1639
Place: Amsterdam
Dimensions: 37.7 x 49.8 cm (14¾ x 19½ in)
Condition Rating: VG+

Out of stock

Hondius 1631 western hemisphere with polar inserts.

Details

North and South America, with insets of both polar regions. Only slight indication is given of the Great Lakes, California is still part of the mainland, and there is a very large lake in New Mexico around which are scattered the seven cities of Cibola. Seven sailing ships grace the ocean, pursued by three sea monsters.

This the third state of the Hondius map which first appeared in 1618 with the imprint of Jodocus Hondius, of which state there are only three known copies. The present state is dated 1631, and the imprint has been changed to “Auct: Henrico Hondio.”

French text on verso, with signature mark, indicating it was issued in the 1639 (or later) edition of Nouvel Atlas.

Cartographer(s):

Henricus Hondius

Henricus Hondius (1597-1651) was a Dutch engraver and cartographer and a member of a prominent family of mapmakers and publishers in Amsterdam. His father, Jodocus Hondius, an engraver and geographer, had purchased part of the estate after Gerhard Mercator. Henricus was instrumental in the first Hondius edition of Mercator’s 1595 atlas (1606). When the father died in 1612, the family business was passed on to him and his brother, Jodocus the Younger. They ran the firm together for nine more years until Henricus decided to venture out independently.

Family ties remained close, and in the early 1630s, Henricus joined forces with his brother-in-law (husband to his sister), the highly skilled engraver Johannes Jansonnius. Together, they recreate and expand the Mercator atlas to such an extent that its contents since have come to be classified as Mercator-Hondius-Janssonius maps. Henricus Hondius died in Amsterdam in 1651.

Condition Description

A few faint brown spots; near fine.

References

Burden 192, state 3; Wagner, NW Coast, 313