Willem Janzsoon Blaeu / Giacomo Giovanni Rossi:  Totius Europae Nova Et Exacta Tabula Ex Optimis Tum Geographorum Tum Aliorum Scriptus Collecta et ad Hodiernam Regnorum Principatum et Maiorum Partium Distinctionem Accommodata per Guglielmum Blaew Amsterdam

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Title: Totius Europae Nova Et Exacta Tabula Ex Optimis Tum Geographorum Tum Aliorum Scriptus Collecta et ad Hodiernam Regnorum Principatum et Maiorum Partium Distinctionem Accommodata per Guglielmum Blaew Amsterdam

Map Maker: Willem Janzsoon Blaeu /  Giacomo Giovanni Rossi

Description:

Spectacular example of Rossi's 4 sheet map of Europe, dedicated to Carlo Medici and attributed to Guillaume Blaeu.

The Rossi Family was perhaps the single most famous and prolific map publishing family working in Rome in the second half of the 17th Century.  Their prolific production and finely engraved multi-sheet maps were at the forefront of a revival in cartographic production in Rome, which had diminished as a center for the production of commercial maps after the demise of the so-called Lafreri School and ascendency of the Dutch School of mapmaking at the end of the 16th Century.

Rossi prepared a number of multi-sheet maps, including 4 sheet maps of the World and Continents, which were engraved primarily as objects of art, for display in the public halls and other gathering places in Rome, to be admired and as a reflection of the status and worldliness of their owners.  Because the maps were intended for public display, the ravishes of time and the elements have conspired to prevent the survival of all but a very few examples and the maps re now extremely rare. One dealer in London wrote of his example that it was the only known example in private hands and one of only three known copies, the others in the Vatican (Rome) and Biblioteque Nationale (Paris). While our view of the map's rarity is not so extreme, it is the only example we have ever seen.

Condition Description: Removed from original linen, washed, deacidified and the 4 sheets rejoined. Minor restorations to areas of loss, all relatively minor. Remnants of several was spots and some old color barely visible and faded to the point of being nearly invisible long

Related Categories:
Maps of Europe
Maps of Europe