Beschreibung:

ORTELIUS, Abraham. Theatrum Orbis Terrarum.. [Parergon in quo Veteris Geographiae aliquot tabulae...; Nomenclator Ptolemaicus..] Antwerp: Christopher Plantin, 1584. 2° (455 x 320mm). Mounted on guards throughout. Engraved architectural title, Parergon with drop-head title with woodcut surround, Nomenclator title with woodcut vignette, engraved portrait of Ortelius by Phillip Galle, 112 double-page engraved maps (including the two-sheet map of Egypt), ALL FINELY HAND-COLOURED BY A CONTEMPORARY HAND. (Title and dedication leaf repaired at outer margin, the title lightly soiled, the map of Ireland loosely inserted from another smaller copy, 4 maps cleanly torn at centrefold, several maps with marginal annotations in a 17th century hand.) Late 18th-century English russia gilt, with contemporary red morocco panels mounted on the covers, these panels panelled in gilt with coronets at the corners and centrally-placed coroneted arms, gilt and gauffered edges (rubbed and scuffed, small tear to lower cover). Provenance : Unidentified ?European arms (binding); early manuscript notes (in English and Latin, on maps of Africa, China and South East Asia); Lady Margaret Smith Burges (armorial bookplate, married in 1814 to become Countess of Poulett, see inscription, dated 1823, leaving the book to her cousin); John Ynyr Burges (b.1798). Second Latin edition printed by Plantin. A FINE TALL COPY WITH CONTEMPORARY HAND-COLOURING. Koeman III. Ort 21; Phillips Atlases 388. In this copy the world map, Typus orbis terrarum , is Shirley 122, plate I, state 2 and Koeman's map 75 Pedemontanae vicinorumque is number 69, the following maps (nos.69-74) being transposed in numbering by one. This copy also varies from Koeman in having the first states of maps 48 and 50 and the first issue of number 36 Nobilis Hannoniae . The arms on the covers together with the quality of the colouring would suggest that this copy was made up for an aristocratic client. The curious and interesting notes on the maps of Africa, China and Iniae Orientalis are in a 17th century hand (one note mentions 1658) and take the form of informed comments and occasionally wild speculations about various locations shown on the maps. A manuscript note on G3v refers to a visit by Ortelius to England in 1576, "and was as our Camden says the adviser and consequently the first cause of his Great Work His Brittania."