• Title : Regionum Italiae Mediarum Tabula Geographica Par Guill. Delisle.....1711
• Ref #: 31904
• Size:  28in x 21in (660mm x 535mm)
• Date : 1711
• Condition: (A+) Fine Condition

Description:
This large beautifully engraved hand coloured original antique map of Rome and the regions surrounding the ancient capital was engraved in 1711 - the date is engraved at the foot of the map - and was published by Guillaume Delisle in the Atlas Nouveau. (Ref: M&B; Tooley)   

Condition Report
Paper thickness and quality: - Very heavy and stable
Paper color: - Off white
Age of map color: - Original
Colors used: - Yellow, green, pink
General color appearance: - Authentic
Paper size: -  28in x 21in (660mm x 535mm)
Plate size: - 24in x 18 1/2in (610mm x 470mm)
Margins: - min. 1in (25mm)

Imperfections:
Margins: - Repair to bottom margin
Plate area: - Light creasing and slight discolouration to bottom centerold
Verso: - None

• Title : Tabula Italiae Antiqua Geographica...MDCCLXIV
• Date : 1764
• Size: 29in x 21in (740mm x 535mm)
• Ref #: 92297
• Condition: (A+) Fine Condition

Description:
This large finely engraved and highly detailed original antique map of Italy by Jean Baptiste Bourguignon D\'Anville was engraved in 1764 - dated in the tile cartouche - and was published in Jean-Baptiste Bourguinon D\'Anville\'s large elephant folio atlas Atlas Generale.

General Definitions:
Paper thickness and quality: - Heavy and stable
Paper color : - off white
Age of map color: - Original
Colors used: - Yellow, green, pink, blue
General color appearance: - Authentic
Paper size: - 29in x 21in (740mm x 535mm)
Plate size: - 25in x 20in (635mm x 510mm)
Margins: - Min 1/2in (12mm)

Imperfections:
Margins: - Age toning along centerfold
Plate area: - Age toning along centerfold
Verso: - Age toning along centerfold

Background: 
Since classical times, ancient Phoenicians, Carthaginians and Greeks established settlements in the south of Italy, with Etruscans and Celts inhabiting the centre and the north of Italy respectively and various ancient Italian tribes and Italic peoples dispersed throughout the Italian Peninsula and insular Italy. The Italic tribe known as the Latins formed the Roman Kingdom, which eventually became a republic that conquered and assimilated other nearby civilisations. Ultimately the Roman Empire emerged as the dominant power in the Mediterranean basin, conquering much of the ancient world and becoming the leading cultural, political and religious centre of Western civilisation. The legacy of the Roman Empire is widespread and can be observed in the global distribution of civilian law, republican governments, Christianity and the Latin script.
During the Early Middle Ages Italy suffered sociopolitical collapse amid calamitous barbarian invasions, but by the 11th century, numerous rival city-states and maritime republics, mainly in the northern and central regions of Italy, rose to great prosperity through shipping, commerce and banking, laying down the groundwork for modern capitalism.These mostly independent statelets, acting as Europe\'s main spice trade hubs with Asia and the Near East, often enjoyed a greater degree of democracy and wealth in comparison to the larger feudal monarchies that were consolidating throughout Europe at the time, though much of central Italy remained under the control of the theocratic Papal States, while Southern Italy remained largely feudal until the 19th century, partially as a result of a succession of Byzantine, Arab, Norman and Spanish conquests of the region.
The Renaissance began in Italy and spread to the rest of Europe, bringing a renewed interest in humanism, science, exploration and art. Italian culture flourished at this time, producing famous scholars, artists and polymaths such as Leonardo da Vinci, Galileo, Michelangelo and Machiavelli. Italian explorers such as Marco Polo, Christopher Columbus, Amerigo Vespucci and Giovanni da Verrazzano discovered new routes to the Far East and the New World, helping to usher in the European Age of Discovery. Nevertheless, Italy\'s commercial and political power significantly waned with the opening of the Atlantic trade route and the route to the Indian Ocean via the Cape of Good Hope, both of which bypassed the Mediterranean. Furthermore, the Italian city-states constantly engaged one another in bloody warfare, culminating in the Italian Wars of the 15th and 16th centuries that left them exhausted, with no one emerging as a dominant power. The weakened Italian sovereigns soon fell victim to conquest by European powers such as France, Spain and Austria.

• Title : L Italie Publiee Sous Les Auspices De Monseigneur Le Duc D Orleans, Premier Prince Du Sang....Par L Sr D Anville...MDCCXLIII 
• Date : 1743
• Condition: (A) Very Good Condition
• Ref:  92312
• Size: 32in x 28in (820mm x 710mm)

Description:
This large scarce original copper-plate engraved antique map of contemporary Italy, Sicily, Sardinia, Corsica & Malta by Charles-Antoine Coypel was engraved by Pierre-Alexandre Aveline (1702–1760) (both names engraved under cartouche) in 1743 - dated in cartouche - and was published by Jean-Baptiste Bourguinon D Anvilles in his large elephant folio atlas Atlas Generale.
A scarce and hard to find map with two famous names Charles-Antoine Coypel & Pierre-Alexandre Aveline engraved below the cartouche, I am assuming as both drawer & engraver.

General Definitions:
Paper thickness and quality: - Heavy and stable
Paper color : - off white
Age of map color: -
Colors used: -
General color appearance: -
Paper size: - 32in x 28in (820mm x 710mm)
Plate size: - 31 1/2in x 27in (810mm x 690mm)
Margins: - Min 1/8in (2mm)

Imperfections:
Margins: - Top margin cropped to border
Plate area: - Light creasing
Verso: - Creasing

Background: 
Since classical times the countries bordering the enclosed waters of the Mediterranean had been well versed in the use of maps and sea charts and in Italy, more than anywhere else, the traditional knowledge was kept alive during the many hundreds of years following the collapse of the Roman Empire. By the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries the seamen of Venice, Genoa and Amalfi traded to far countries, from the Black Sea ports and the coasts of Palestine and Egypt in the East to Flanders and the southern coasts of England and Ireland in the West, their voyages guided by portulan charts and the use of the newly invented compass. For a time Italian supremacy in cartography passed to Aragon and the Catalan map makers based on Majorca, but by the year 1400 the power and wealth of the city states of Venice, Genoa, Florence and Milan surpassed any in Europe. Florence, especially, under the rule of the Medici family, became not only a great trading and financial centre but also the focal point of the rediscovery of the arts and learning of the ancient world. In this milieu a number of manuscript world maps were produced, of which one by Fra Mauro (c. 1459) is the most notable, but the event of the greatest importance in the history of cartography occurred in the year 1400 when a Florentine, Palla Strozzi, brought from Constantinople a Greek manuscript copy of Claudius Ptolemy\\\'s Geographia, which, 1,250 years after its compilation, came as a revelation to scholars in Western Europe. In the following fifty years or so manuscript copies, translated into Latin and other languages, became available in limited numbers but the invention of movable-type printing transformed the scene: the first copy without maps being printed in 1475 followed by many with copper-engraved maps, at Bologna in 1477, Rome 1478, 1490, 1507 and 1508, and Florence 1482.
About the year 1485 the first book of sea charts, compiled by Bartolommeo dalli Sonetti, was printed in Venice and in the first part of the sixteenth century a number of world maps were published, among them one compiled in 1506 by Giovanni Contarini, engraved by Francesco Rosselli, which was the first printed map to show the discoveries in the New World. In the following years there were many attractive and unusual maps of Islands (Isolano) by Bordone, Camocio and Porcacchi, but more important was the work of Giacomo (Jacopo) Gastaldi, a native of Piedmont who started life as an engineer in the service of the Venetian Republic before turning to cartography as a profession. His maps, produced in great variety and quantity, were beautifully drawn copperplate engravings and his style and techniques were widely copied by his contemporaries. From about 1550 to 1580 many of Gastaldi\\\'s maps appeared in the collections of maps known as Lafreri \\\'atlases\\\', a term applied to groups of maps by different cartographers brought together in one binding. As the contents of such collections varied considerably they were no doubt assembled at the special request of wealthy patrons and are now very rare indeed.
About this time, for a variety of historical and commercial reasons, Italy\\\'s position as the leading trading and financial nation rapidly declined and with it her superiority in cartography was lost to the vigorous new states in the Low Countries. That is not to say, of course, that Italian skills as map makers were lost entirely for it was not until 1620 that the first printed maps of Italy by an Italian, Giovanni Magini, appeared, and much later in the century there were fine maps by Giacomo de Rossi and Vincenzo Coronelli, the latter leading a revival of interest in cartography at the end of the century. Coronelli was also famous for the construction of magnificent large-size globes and for the foundation in Venice in 1680 of the first geographical society.
In the eighteenth century the best-known names are Antonio Zatta, Rizzi-Zannoni and Giovanni Cassini.
We ought to mention the work of Baptista Boazio who drew a series of maps in A Summarie and True Discourse of Sir Francis Drake\\\'s West Indian Voyage, published in 1588-89, and who is especially noted for a very fine map of Ireland printed in 1599 which was incorporated in the later editions of the Ortelius atlases. It is perhaps appropriate also to refer to two English map makers who spent many years in exile in Italy: the first, George Lily, famous for the splendid map of the British Isles issued in Rome in 1546, and the second, Robert Dudley, who exactly one hundred years later was responsible for the finest sea atlas of the day, Dell\\\' Arcano del Mare, published in Florence. Both of these are described in greater detail elsewhere in this handbook. (Ref: Tooley, Koeman)

• Title : Rome Ancienne et Moderne
• Ref #:  82075
• Size: 20 1/2in x 17in (520mm x 430mm)
• Date : 1719
• Condition: (A+) Fine Condition

Description:
This beautifully hand coloured original antique map of Rome, comparing ancient Rome against contemporary Rome in the early 18th century was published in the 1719 edition of Henri Abraham Chatelains Atlas Historique.

General Definitions:
Paper thickness and quality: - Heavy and stable
Paper color : - off white
Age of map color: - Early
Colors used: - Yellow, green, blue, pink
General color appearance: - Authentic
Paper size: - 20 1/2in x 17in (520mm x 430mm)
Plate size: - 17 1/2in x 13 1/2in (445mm x 340mm)
Margins: - Min 1in (25mm)

Imperfections:
Margins: - None
Plate area: - None
Verso: - None

Background: 
The history of Rome spans 28 centuries. While Roman mythology dates the founding of Rome at around 753 BC, the site has been inhabited for much longer, making it one of the oldest continuously occupied sites in Europe. The cities early population originated from a mix of Latins, Etruscans, and Sabines. Eventually, the city successively became the capital of the Roman Kingdom, the Roman Republic and the Roman Empire, and is regarded as the birthplace of Western civilization and by some as the first ever metropolis. It was first called The Eternal City by the Roman poet Tibullus in the 1st century BC, and the expression was also taken up by Ovid, Virgil, and Livy. Rome is also called the Caput Mundi (Capital of the World). After the fall of the Western Empire, which marked the beginning of the Middle Ages, Rome slowly fell under the political control of the Papacy, which had settled in the city since the 1st century AD, until in the 8th century it became the capital of the Papal States, which lasted until 1870. Beginning with the Renaissance, almost all the popes since Nicholas V (1447–1455) pursued over four hundred years a coherent architectural and urban program aimed at making the city the artistic and cultural centre of the world. In this way, Rome became first one of the major centres of the Italian Renaissance, and then the birthplace of both the Baroque style and Neoclassicism. Famous artists, painters, sculptors and architects made Rome the centre of their activity, creating masterpieces throughout the city. In 1871, Rome became the capital of the Kingdom of Italy, which, in 1946, became the Italian Republic. (Ref: Tooley; M&B)

• Title : Amerique Meridionale Divisee en ses Principales Parties...1691
• Ref #:  35630
• Condition: (A+) Fine Condition
• Size: 37 1/2in x 24 3/4in (940mm x 630mm)
• Date: 1691

Description:
This original beautifully hand coloured (with gold highlights) antique very large map of South America was engraved in 1691 - dated in Cartouche - and was published by Hubert Jaillot in his monumental Atlas Nouveau.
This map is beautifully hand coloured with gold highlights along country borders and the cartouches indicating it was once part of an Imperial Atlas.
The Imperial atlases were hand coloured using gold highlights and other rare colours which at the time was extremely expensive and available at the time only to royalty and the very rich.

General Definitions:
Paper thickness and quality: - Heavy and stable
Paper color : - Off white
Age of map color: - Original
Colors used: - Yellow, green, blue, pink, blue, gold
General color appearance: - Authentic
Paper size: - 37 1/2in x 24 3/4in (940mm x 630mm)
Plate size: - 35 1/2in x 23in (900mm x 590mm)
Margins: - Min 1in (25mm)

Imperfections:
Margins: - Age toning along margins
Plate area: - Crease along centerfold
Verso: - None

Background:
The map include lines of latitude and longitude, some topographical details, location of settlements, rivers, and lakes (including the lakes Parime, thought to be where the fabulous El Dorado was located) as well as the boundaries of the possessions of the European claimants to South America.
Extremely decorative cartouche with dedication to Le Dauphin, and his coat of arms in top.
After Nicolas Sanson, Hubert Jaillot and Pierre Duval were the most important French cartographers of the seventeenth & eighteenth centuries. Jaillot, originally a sculptor, became interested in geography after his marriage to the daughter of Nicolas Berey (1606-65), a famous map colourist, and went into partnership in Paris with Sanson's sons. There, from about 1669, he undertook the re-engraving, enlarging and re-publishing of the Sanson maps in sheet form and in atlases, sparing no effort to fill the gap in the map trade left by the destruction of Blaeu's printing establishment in Amsterdam in 1672. Many of his maps were printed in Amsterdam (by Pierre Mortier) as well as in Paris. One of his most important works was a magnificent sea atlas, Le Neptune François, published in 1693 and compiled in co-operation with J D Cassini. This was re-published shortly afterwards by Pierre Mortier in Amsterdam with French, Dutch and English texts, the charts having been re-engraved. Eventually, after half a century, most of the plates were used again as the basis for a revised issue published by J N Bellin in 1753.(Ref: Tooley; M&B)

• Title : Antri Sibillae, Lacus Agnianus
• Ref #:  35013
• Size: 20 3/4in x 16in (525mm x 405mm)
• Date : 1572
• Condition: (A+) Fine Condition

Description:
This beautifully hand coloured original antique print, a birds eye view of the Italian Volcanic Lake Agnano and the Grotta del cane or Fontana - Cave of the Dogs - located in Pozzuoli, north of Naples, Italy was published by Georg Braun & Frans Hogenberg for the 1572 atlas of town plans Civiates Orbis Terrarum intended as a companion to Abraham Ortelius's master Atlas Theatrum Orbis Terrarum published in 1570.
The top view of Lake Agnano shows friends Abraham Ortelius & Georg Hoffnagel meeting at the Lake in a way to impress upon the reader the real importance of Nature. These are beautifully engraved with wonderful hand colouring on strong, sturdy paper.

General Description:
Paper thickness and quality: - Heavy and stable
Paper color: - off white
Age of map color: - Early
Colors used: - Green, blue, red, yellow
General color appearance: - Authentic
Paper size: - 20 3/4in x 16in (525mm x 405mm)
Plate size: - 18 1/2in x 13in (470mm x 330mm)
Margins: - Min 1in (25mm)

Imperfections:
Margins: - None
Plate area: - None
Verso: - Colour show-through

The Cave of Dogs is a small cave on the eastern side of the Phlegraean Fields near Pozzuoli, Naples. Inside the cave is a fumarole that releases carbon dioxide of volcanic origin. It was a famous if gruesome tourist attraction for travellers on the Grand Tour. The CO₂ gas, being denser than air, tends to accumulate in the deeper parts of the cave. Local guides, for a fee, would suspend small animals inside it—usually dogs—until they became unconscious. Because humans inhaled air from a higher level they were not affected. The dogs might be revived by submerging them in the cold waters of the nearby Lake Agnano. Famous tourists who came to see this attraction included Goethe, Alexandre Dumas père, and Mark Twain. The lake became polluted and it was drained in 1870; the spectacle fell into desuetude and the cave was closed. However the area is now being restored by volunteers.

Lago di Agnano or Lake Agnano was a circular lake, some 6½ km in circumference, which occupied the crater of the extinct volcano of Agnano 8 km west of Naples, Italy. It was apparently not formed until the Middle Ages, as it is not mentioned by ancient writers; it was drained in 1870.
On the south bank are the Stufe di San Germano, natural sulphureous vapour baths, and close by is the Grotta del Cane. From the floor of this cave warm carbonic acid gas constantly rises to a height of 18 inches (46 cm): the fumes render a dog insensible in a few seconds. It is mentioned by Pliny the Elder. Remains of an extensive Roman building and some statues have been discovered close by.(Ref: Tooley; M&B)