"Mappamondo", Buffier, Claude

This small, but charming double hemisphere map was engraved by Giovanni Petroschi for Buffier's "Nuova Geografia" and shows the Western Hemisphere with California California as an island. This cartographic myth was evidently copied from earlier charts, as by 1787 the island concept had been disproved & discarded by most major cartographers. In the eastern hemisphere only the western coast of Australia is drawn in though the eastern coast had been discovered and surveyed by Capt. James Cook on his first voyage to the Pacific in 1768-1771. A partial outline of a large Southern Continent fills the Antarctic region. Although land contours on both hemispheres are drawn in, the charm of the map lies in its inaccuracies and the lack of universal knowledge still apparent in mapmaking in some European centers in the 18th century.

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Condition: A

Issued folding, now flattened, on watermarked paper with a couple of minute worm holes only visible when held to light.