"L'Amerique Meridionale Divisee en ses Principales Parties", Jaillot, Alexis-Hubert

This handsome map of the continent is decorated with elaborate title and scale of miles cartouches balancing the lower portion of the map bearing images of Native Americans, flora and fauna. One cartouche encloses the map's title while the other presents eight different distance scales, recording the diversity of European measurement systems before the adoption of the metric system during the French Revolution. Cartographically, the map shows the course of the Amazon delineated in a fairly accurate manner, yet it shows the river's source in a fascinating, interlacing maze of waterways. The fictitious Mer de Parime is named within Guyana along with the mythical Manoa el Dorado on its banks. In addition, the Rio Paraguay erroneously begins in a lake named Xarayes in the middle of Brazil. An alternate Latin title appears above the map: "America Meridionalis in suas Praecipuas Partes Accurate Divisa, ad usum Serenissimi Burgundiae Ducis."

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Condition: B+

A dark impression on a bright sheet with a couple of minor spots, extraneous creasing along the centerfold, and an archivally repaired centerfold separation at bottom.