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China.
Amsterdam, [1606], 1619. Hand-colored engraving, 13.75” x 18.75” plus margins. CONDITION: Very good, .75” loss to upper-right corner and some light soiling to margins, old repair to separations in lower margin along central vertical fold. An intriguing map of East Asia published in the Mercator-Hondius Atlas, featuring exotic descriptions of the territory based on early travel accounts. Based in part on Luis Jorge de Barbuda’s map of China and Teixeira’s map of Japan, Hondius’s map centers on China, Japan, and Korea, and includes parts of India, Central Asia (“Tartary”), Russia, and North America. Korea appears as an island—not uncommon in the seventeenth century—although an accompanying annotation questions this portrayal. The “Chinese Ocean” contains two ships, one European and one Japanese, and a sea monster in the lower right corner. A scale bar at lower right shows distance in both German miles and Spanish leagues. Hondius’s striking depiction of the region incorporates ample commentary encompassing both European knowledge and speculative interpretation. Several fascinating annotations in Latin text provide insight into how early European travel accounts shaped perceptions of the region. In China, the Great Wall “of four hundred leagues” is described as a deterrent against “Tartar” invasions. In Sancii province, a circular lake is depicted, accompanied by a note indicating that it was the site of a devastating flood in 1557 that destroyed several settlements. The only known survivor, shown in a small illustration, was found clinging to a floating tree. Another note describes an illustration of a sail-powered coach, also in China, which is likely an exaggerated description of sail-powered wheelbarrows. On the right of the map near Japan is an image of a man being crucified and speared, surrounded by an ornamental border surmounted by a cross. This is almost surely a reference to the events of 1597, when twenty-six Spanish, Portuguese, and Japanese Catholics were executed by crucifixion by the authorities in Nagasaki. Japan’s reputation in Europe suffered considerably, as evidenced on this map. Another note describes how the Japanese raise only a small number of their children from infancy, the rest being abandoned or killed. The northwest part of America, across the mythical Strait of Anian, is described as a land of nomadic peoples who, like the Tartars, have no cities. A deer and fox represent American fauna. Several annotations elsewhere on the map offer additional compelling observations. This map appeared in the Mercator/Hondius Atlas, an updated republication of Gerard Mercator’s groundbreaking Atlas. Jodocus Hondius, working with Cornelis Claesz, acquired the plates for Mercator’s atlas and republished the work under his own name beginning in 1606, adding thirty-seven new maps to fill gaps in the original work, and in order to compete with Ortelius’s Theatrum Orbis Terrarum. Following his death in 1612, Hondius’s work was carried on by his widow, Colletta, and their two sons, Jodocus Jr. (1595–1629) and Henricus (1597–1651). The years after 1619 saw the end of the collaboration between the Hondius brothers on their father’s Atlas when Hondius Jr. established his own firm in Amsterdam and began producing maps for a competing atlas. Hondius Jr. died young in 1629, and the plates were sold (against Henricus’s will) to Willem Blaeu, a competitor of the family. Henricus continued to republish the Mercator/Hondius Atlas under his own name until 1633, and in collaboration with his brother-in-law Jan Jansson (also known as Johannes Janssonius) until 1641, adding material as they went. Jansson continued publishing the atlas as Atlas Novus and Atlas Maior under his own name until 1666. Jodocus Hondius Sr. (1563–1612) was a Flemish cartographer, publisher, and engraver. Born in Wakken and raised in Ghent, Hondius (a Protestant) fled to London in 1584 to escape persecution during the Eighty Years’ War. Following a successful career in England, he returned to the Low Countries in 1593 and established a firm in Amsterdam. Hondius Sr. was prolific in the two decades prior to his death, producing numerous maps of Britain and Europe, several world maps, and a 1605 version of Ptolemy’s Geographia in collaboration with Claesz. REFERENCES: Caboara, Marco. Regnum Chinae (2022), p. 198, #1; Van der Krogt, Peter. Koeman's Atlantes Neerlandici (1997) 1-8410:1A; Moreland, Carl and David Bannister. Christie’s Collector’s Guide: Antique Maps (Oxford: Phaidon / Christie’s Limited, 1986), pp. 102–103; “Hondius and Hondius-Janssonius Family” at University of Michigan Library online; “The ‘Atlas’ by Mercator and Hondius” at Utrecht University online.
Item #9754
Price: $2,500.00
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