Published by the Hakluyt Society in 1889, Edmund (or John) Chilmeade's English translation of Tractus De Globis Et Eorum Usu by Robert Hues regarding "those Globes that were set forth at London, Anno 1593... those great Globes made by William Saunderson of London; concerning the use of which especially we have written this discourse." Sanderson, a London merchant-adventurer, commissioned Emery Molyneux to construct a pair of globes, terrestrial and celestial; the globes became known as the first made in England by an Englishman.
[vii], viii-lviii, [2], 229, [230, blank]; [4], [1]-37, [38, blank], 16, (1 frontispiece, 1 lithographed folding map).
Robert Hues (1553–1632) was an English geographer and mathematician best known for his work on globes and navigation. Educated at St. Mary Hall, Oxford, he gained prominence through his treatise Tractatus de Globis et eorum Usu (1594), which provided a systematic explanation of the use of terrestrial and celestial globes for navigation and astronomy. Based on firsthand observations during voyages with Thomas Cavendish and Walter Raleigh, Hues’s work was influential in advancing practical navigation techniques. His Tractatus was widely used by navigators and scholars, contributing to the broader understanding of globes as essential tools for early modern cartography and exploration.
"Robert Hues coupled theoretical knowledge with practical experience to a degree hitherto rare. Henceforth such qualifications were to become common amongst English navigators... Hues combined mastery of the practice as well as of the theory of navigation, his treatise is of particular interest. He began with a word on the physical features of the navigator's ideal globe, placing emphasis on the true and exact decription of places and requiring that the globes should be sufficiently large without their weight being cumbersome.... Hues's Tractatus de Globis remained the standard work on globes for nearly a century." - D.W. Waters.