Beschreibung:

SELLER, JOHN A Mapp of New England by John Seller, Hydrographer to the King. London: "John Seller ... And are to bee sold at his shop at the Hermitage in Wapping and by Iohn Hills in Exchange Alley in Cornhill, London," circa 1676. First edition, second issue (with the dedication cartouche to Robert Thomson). Hand-colored engraved map on watermarked laid paper. 17 1/2 x 21 3/4 inches (44.5 x 55 cm); framed. Trimmed within neatline just touching edge of border at the lower corners only, with slightly fuller margins to sides and upper edge, tipped to backing board at head of fold only, a small area in the border at the foot of the fold infilled and with minor manuscript replacement, lightly toned along center fold, old label of The Old Print Shop to frame verso. An exceedingly rare and early English map of New England, the first not derived from Dutch prototypes. Seller's A Mapp of New England appears to have been issued separately but also with copies of Seller's circa 1682 pamphlet A Description of New England and later in Seller's Atlas Maritimus (though few copies report it present). John Seller is an intriguing and important player in the early map and nautical chart publishing business in England, having begun as an instrument maker, accused and acquitted of high treason for an incident initiated on the New England walk of the Royal Exchange, later made Hydrographer to the King, and mentioned several times in Pepys diaries. The Mapp of New England contains an interesting display of early information on the colonies: the plan of Massachusetts is possibly derived from William Reed's boundary survey of 1665; the rendering of Long Island after John Scott's unpublished manuscript map; a vignette of Indian dwellings at upper left from De Bry; and the animals throughout reminiscent of those on American maps by Blaeu and Visscher. There have been no separate copy of the map or a copy of the map with text in the auction record since the Streeter sale ("the map is the earliest separately published map of New England and the eastern edge of New York" - Streeter). For the Description of New England see Sabin 79026; Streeter 633; Bradford 4893. For the map McCorkle. New England in Early Printed Maps, 676.5; Stevens & Tree. Comparative Cartography, 1967, no. 34; Allen, Long Island Maps and Their Makers, 12-16. C