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Rare Book Monthly

Book Catalogue Reviews - January - 2014 Issue

Maps, Globes, and Atlases from Martayan Lan

Maps, globes, atlases and more.

Maps, globes, atlases and more.

Martayan Lan has released their Catalogue 49: Select Maps, Globes, & Atlases. Their specialty is cartography, and this catalogue also includes some sea charts and city views. Many centuries are covered, with maps as far back as the 15th century, when the world was still essentially seen as it had been by Ptolemy fourteen centuries earlier. Maps adjusted as our understanding of the world evolved. That history can be seen in the maps offered in this latest Martayan Lan catalogue. Here are a few selections.

 

The last look at Ptolemy's pre-Columbian world can be seen in this 1493 world map from Hartmann Schedel's Nuremberg Chronicle. Schedel had put together an account of world history all the way from Creation to the present time, which was then 1493. That was the year Columbus returned with news of the New World, but Schedel's history was published before this news reached him. Ptolemy's world consisted of Europe, northern Africa, and western Asia. Not only was the New World still unknown, Schedel did not include Bartholomew Dias' discovery of the southern tip of Africa and the fact that the Indian Ocean could be reached that way (it had previously been thought that the Indian Ocean was land locked). Schedel's map was included with the section on Noah, evidently designed to show how his descendants had spread across the world. However, it also contains depictions of various half human creatures supposedly found in far-off places who certainly could not have been descendants of Noah. Item 5. Priced at $27,500.

 

Item 14 is the only extant map of the Americas associated with the first of the great Dutch mapmakers, Gerard Mercator. It is “associated” since it was actually executed by his grandson, Michael, a year after Gerard died in 1594. The two continents are more rounded, blob-like than the sharp lines known today but there is no difficulty in recognizing their shapes. The poles reflect earlier misconceptions. The Arctic displays two of the four separate islands then believed to exist in the far north, while Antarctica is the massive southern continent long believed to exist until disproven by Cook almost two centuries later. Four corner inserts display details for the Gulf of Mexico, Hispaniola, Cuba, and the maps title – America sive India Nova... $8,500.

 

Item 17 is a map of the east coast of North America from the Flemish geographer Cornelius Wytfliet circa 1597. It is titled Norumbega Et Virginia, the first map to prominently display the name “Virginia” in the title. Norumbega was a legendary advanced city that proved to be a myth, though Wytfliet appears to use it as a name for everything north of Virginia up through southern New England. The coast line is reasonably accurate for the day though details were not known. Such features as Long Island and Cape Cod are missing. $6,500.

 

Item 23 is Robert Dudley's Carta particolare della Baia de Messico con la costa. It is the first printed sea chart of the Gulf of Mexico, published in 1648. It ranges from Florida to the Yucatan, including western Cuba. It provides critical information for mariners, such as depths, currents, and hazards. Of notable interest are the numerous place names along the coast, few identifiable today. Some of the rivers in Texas do appear to match up, Dudley's “R. Montanhas” being the Sabine River, “R: d'Ouro” the Trinity River, and “R: Madalena” the Nueces River. “R: Escondido” may be the Rio Grande. Dudley was an unusual figure among early mapmakers. He was the illegitimate son of the Earl of Essex, who made his way to Florence, where this map was published, as the circumstances of his birth prevented him from obtaining a position appropriate for his skills in England. $55,000.

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  • DOYLE
    Rare Books, Autographs & Maps
    July 23, 2025
    DOYLE, July 23: WALL, BERNHARDT. Greenwich Village. Types, Tenements & Temples. Estimate $300-500
    DOYLE, July 23: STOKES, I. N. PHELPS. The Iconography of Manhattan Island, 1498-1909. New York: Robert H. Dodd, 1915-28. Estimate: $3,000-5,000
    DOYLE, July 23: [AUTOGRAPH - US PRESIDENT]FRANKLIN D. ROOSEVELT. A signed photograph of Franklin D. Roosevelt. Estimate $500-800
    DOYLE, July 23: [ARION PRESS]. ABBOTT, EDWIN A. Flatland. A Romance of Many Dimensions. San Francisco, 1980. Estimate $2,000-3,000.
    DOYLE, July 23: TOLSTOY, LYOF N. and NATHAN HASKELL DOLE, translator. Anna Karénina ... in eight parts. New York: Thomas Y. Crowell & Co., [1886]. Estimate: $400-600
    DOYLE, July 23: ROWLING, J.K. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. London: Bloomsbury, 2000. Estimate $1,200-1,800
  • Forum Auctions
    Fine Books, Manuscripts and Works on Paper
    17th July 2025
    Forum, July 17: Lucianus Samosatensis. Dialogoi, editio princeps, second issue, Florence, Laurentius Francisci de Alopa, 1496. £10,000 to £15,000.
    Forum, July 17: Boccaccio (Giovanni). Il Decamerone, Florence, Philippo di Giunta, 1516. £10,000 to £15,000.
    Forum, July 17: Henry VII (King) & Philip the Fair (Duke of Burgundy). [Intercursus Magnus], [Commercial and Political Treaty between Henry VII and Philip Duke of Burgundy], manuscript copy in Latin, original vellum, 1499. £8,000 to £12,000.
    Forum, July 17: Bible, English. The Holy Bible, Conteyning the Old Testament, and the New, Robert Barker, 1613. £4,000 to £6,000.
    Forum, July 17: Bond (Michael). A Bear Called Paddington, first edition, signed presentation inscription from the author, 1958. £4,000 to £6,000.
    Forum Auctions
    Fine Books, Manuscripts and Works on Paper
    17th July 2025
    Forum, July 17: Yeats (William Butler). The Secret Rose, first edition, with extensive autograph corrections, additions and amendments by the author for a new edition, 1897. £6,000 to £8,000.
    Forum, July 17: Byron (George Gordon Noel, Lord). Childe Harold's Pilgrimage, bound in dark green morocco elaborately tooled in gilt and with 3 watercolours to fore-edge, by Fazakerley of Liverpool, 1841. £4,000 to £6,000.
    Forum, July 17: Miró (Juan), Wassily Kandinsky, John Buckland-Wright, Stanley William Hayter and others.- Spender (Stephen). Fraternity, one of 101 copies, with signed engravings by 9 artists. £6,000 to £8,000.
    Forum, July 17: Sowerby (George Brettingham). Album comprising 22 leaves of original watercolour drawings of fossil remains of Cheltenham and Vicinity, [c.1840]. £6,000 to £8,000.
    Forum, July 17: Mathematics.- Blue paper copy.- Euclid. De gli Elementi, Urbino, Appresso Domenico Frisolino, 1575. £12,000 to £18,000.
  • Sotheby’s
    Geek Week
    2-17 July | New York
    Sotheby’s, July 15: Buzz Aldrin's FLOWN Apollo 11 Crew-Signed NASA Manned Spacecraft Center Cover. $15,000 to $20,000.
    Sotheby’s, July 15: Lunar Surface Flown Mission Emblem Presented to Tom Stafford by John Young. $8,000 to $12,000.
    Sotheby’s, July 17: Albert Einstein. Typed Letter Signed ("A. Einstein."), to Ann Morrisett, Affirming a Pacifist's Right to Self-Defense, March 21, 1952. $10,000 to $15,000.
    Sotheby’s
    Geek Week
    2-17 July | New York
    Sotheby’s, July 17: Operating and Maintenance Manual for the BINAC Binary Automatic Computer Built for Northrop Aircraft Corporation. Philadelphia, 1949. $30,000 to $50,000.
    Sotheby’s, July 17: Steve Jobs Apple Computer Business Card, c. 1977. $5,000 to $8,000.
    Sotheby’s, July 15: Extensive Chronology of Spacecraft From Apollo to Skylab, Signed by a Member of Every Crewed Apollo Flight and the Commanders of Each Skylab Mission. $5,000 to $8,000.

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