This handsome portrait of John Speed was included as the frontispiece to Theatre of the Empire of Great Britaine beginning in 1631. Engraved by Salomon Savery, a Dutch artist and engraver.

John Speed is considered to be one of the most important figures of all English mapmakers, and two of his crowning achievements were his atlases of Great Britain and the world. His atlas of Great Britain, The Theatre of the Empire of Great Britaine, was first published in 1612 and was intended as a companion to his History of Great Britaine, which was a comprehensive history beginning in Roman times. Speed partnered with London publishers John Sudbury and George Humble to create these works, and Jodocus Hondius Sr. was hired to engrave the maps. Sixty-seven maps of England, Wales, Scotland, Ireland and their counties were engraved for the atlas.

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Condition: B+

A sharp impression on a bright sheet with some extraneous creasing, moderate soiling that is mostly confined to the blank margins, and a chip at bottom left. Small remnants of hinge tape on verso.