Beschreibung:

ORTELIUS, ABRAHAM. Theatrum Orbis Terrarum. Antwerp: Aegidius Coppens Diesth, 20 May 1570. Folio, contemporary vellum, armorial shield painted in upper corner of upper cover, spine lettered in ink, extremities rubbed, covers soiled, upper inner hinge broken, engraved title soiled, margins repaired, 2 small holes to fol. C2 affecting 10 letters, repaired tears to center folds of maps 1, 20 and 36 with slight loss to captions or image, clean fold break to map 33, a few marginal repairs and short marginal tears, a few leaves and maps creased, light foxing, marginal soiling, mostly marginal dampstaining, browning to the last text section . FIRST EDITION, FIRST ISSUE, engraved title, verso blank, Catalogus Auctorum with 87 names, errata at end of index on fol. D2r, C2r with pasted down printed correction slip (half a line), 53 engraved mapsheets, most by Frans Hogenberg. "The first modern geographical atlas...The compilation of a general atlas containing maps of uniform size and bound up in a single volume was the result of a suggestion of a friend...Ortelius, who knew most of the map-makers and map-sellers both in Amsterdam and abroad, gathered together the best available maps of the various countries and had them re-engraved in uniform size"-- The World Encompassed , 135. His list of contributors, which included not only the authors of the original maps but other cartographers and geographers as well, has been of particular value for historians of cartography. The engraved allegorical title with its five female figures representing the five continents (one a mere bust, symbolizing the mostly unexplored continent of "Magellenica", ie., Antarctica), contains what is "probably the earliest allegorical representation of America"--Koeman III, p. 32, and 34-36, Ort 1A; Phillips/ Atlases 374; Sabin 57693; Streeter I, 65.