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"The Definitive Spanish Map of Cuba in the 19th Century -- A Monumental Survey of Cuba on Six Tall Sheets

This monumental six-sheet wall map of Cuba (approximately 13 feet x 4 feet) was produced in Barcelona in 1835 under the direction of Captain-General Francisco Dionisio Vives (the “Conde de Cuba”). The engraved chart, drawn by Carlos Roca and engraved by Domènec Estruch y Jordán, was published by José G. Jasme-Valcourt e Iznardi.

Based upon military surveys conducted by the Spanish Colonial Governor from 1824 to 1831, this 1835 chart is the first known modern topographic survey of Cuba. The work combined new field surveys by military engineers with compilations of older data. In fact, Captain-General Vives himself ordered the compilation from survey notes gathered by Colonel José Jasme-Valcourt (in early drafts) and others; after an eight-month pilot survey by General Moscoso’s team, the complete survey was approved as the “Carta de Vives”.  The map represents a key cartographic innovation: it unites detailed coastline hydrography (soundings), inland terrain, and socio-economic information on one sheet. It set a model for later Spanish mapping (indeed similar techniques would later appear in Spain’s first national atlas).

The map comprises six engraved plates, an extraordinary scale and format for its time. Its Spanish title, in the elaborately pictorial lower-left cartouche, reads (roughly translated):

Geographic and Topographic Chart of the Island of Cuba, dedicated to Her Majesty the Queen Our Lady Doña Isabel II, by the Lieutenant-General, Count of Cuba, and the Commission of Chiefs and Military Officers and Public Surveyors who surveyed it by his command in the years 1824–1831.”

This dedication honors Queen Isabel II (the Child-Queen 1833–68) and emphasizes the royal patronage of Vives and his survey corps in executing the seven-year project.

The ornate title cartouche (lower left) is rendered as a carved stone tablet surrounded by tropical palm and sugarcane plants, flamingos and a caiman. Below the tablet is a plan of Havana, and the tablet bears the above dedication (in Spanish). The intricate decoration celebrates Cuba’s flora and fauna, and the inscription explicitly links the map to Queen Isabel II and Vives (the “Count of Cuba”).

The main map covers the entire island of Cuba (and nearby Bahamian cays) with very detailed topography. A double-frame border is graduated in 1′ latitude/longitude (with Cádiz as prime meridian). Relief is shown by hachures and shading, rivers and roads are drawn, and countless place names (towns, estates, geographic features) are annotated. The cartography is exceptionally thorough for its date: for example, the coastlines are rendered with soundings and anchorage symbols (banks and reefs are drawn and numbered with depths), reflecting up-to-date surveying. The scale of the main map is about 1:320,000, which is large enough to show individual towns, roads, plantations, and orchards. A large “Cuadro estadístico” (statistical table) provides a wealth of geographic, administrative and economic data (see below).

In addition to the island map, eight inset maps (city plans and harbor charts) are scattered around the margins. These detail Cuba’s principal ports and cities (all rendered at scales of c.1:15,000–1:50,000) and one small harbor outside Cuba. Specifically, the chart includes: 

• Havana (La Habana): A large Plano de la ciudad y puerto de La Habana (≈1:16,000) shows the walled old city, harbor and fortifications. It is oriented north-up and includes soundings, wharves and docks, and a dual alphanumeric index identifying major buildings (cathedral, forts, government house, convents, etc.)
• Santiago de Cuba: A Plano de la ciudad de Santiago de Cuba (≈1:16,000) with a keyed reference list. The town and its environs are detailed, including the cathedral, convents and plaza.
• Bahía de Cuba: A Plano de la bahía de Cuba (≈1:48,000), showing the entrance and inner harbor of Santiago with soundings and anchorages. (The letters A–P mark features such as shoals or buoys as explained in the inset.)
• San Carlos de Matanzas: A Plano de la ciudad y bahía de Sn. Carlos de Matanzas (≈city scale 1:14,500, bay 1:44,000). This shows the town (with keys to plazas, fort, bridge, etc.) and the long, curved bay with depth soundings.
• Trinidad: A Plano de la ciudad de Trinidad (≈1:16,000), including a key to churches, fort, plaza, and other landmarks.
• Puerto de Casilda: A Plano del Puerto de Casilda (≈1:43,000), showing the approach to the harbor with soundings (the town itself is small, but the bay is charted).
• Puerto Príncipe (Camagüey): A Ciudad de Sta. María de Puerto Príncipe plan (≈1:16,000) with streets and landmarks keyed. (Puerto Príncipe, in central Cuba, was the old name of Camagüey.)
• San Nicolás (Cabo Mola), Santo Domingo: A small chart Cº Mola ó de S. Nicolás de la Isla de Sto Domingo in the corner. This inset (of the Haitian side of Hispaniola, near Santo Domingo) shows the waterfront at Cape Mola and the San Nicolás works. 

Plans of Santiago de Cuba (“Plano de la ciudad de Santiago de Cuba”) and the adjoining Bay of Cuba are shown, each with soundings and keyed references. These are two of the eight inset plans on the chart. Each inset is carefully drawn with cultivation and trees in the environs. The plans of Havana and Matanzas notably include symbols for cotton fields and palms. 

Below the main map (usually the bottom-center panel) is a large “Cuadro estadístico de la Isla de Cuba”. This statistical tableau gives concise information: a textual geographic description of the island; political–military districts; population totals (free, slave, total) by district; lists of town populations; navigational data (marina and navy); and tables of imports, exports and revenue (for 1830–31). For example, it enumerates the population of Havana, Santiago, Matanzas, Trinidad, Puerto Príncipe, etc., and exports of sugar and tobacco. This integration of statistical data alongside the map was innovative for its time and reflects Enlightenment-era emphasis on empirical knowledge. (The tabular data is headed “Siempre fiel Isla de Cuba”, underscoring the island’s loyalty to the crown.)

The map’s pictorial cartouche (lower left) deserves special mention. It depicts an inscribed stone tablet framed by tropical vegetation: coconut palms, plantain trees, native shrubs, and a basking caiman beneath. A pair of flamingos stands guard, and a crest (unreadable in engraving) lies atop. This imagery explicitly celebrates Cuba’s natural wealth. The inscription on the tablet bears the full title, dedication and legend of authorities (the Queen and Conde de Cuba). In composition, the cartouche sits above an inset plan of Havana, as though marking the island’s “foundation” with the capital at the base. The luxurious graphic style (flora, fauna, ornamental border) is typical of Spanish colonial maps but here executed with exceptional artistry.

Printing so large a map posed technical challenges. The six engraved sheets were printed on heavy paper. The plates had to accommodate the engraved detail and the wide frame border (decorated with a piano-key motif). Such a wall map required one of the few printing houses capable of using enormous copperplates and presses. (Publisher Jasme-Valcourt later published a memoir of the project, emphasizing its cost and scale.)

Produced shortly after the restoration of Spanish control in the Americas, this chart served as a colonial-state project. In the 1820s–30s Cuba was Spain’s most valuable remaining colony, a booming sugar economy with a large, enslaved labor force. Governor Vives (Count of Cuba) was a firm Bourbon loyalist credited with quashing several pro-independence conspiracies.

Under his tenure Cuba enjoyed economic growth and relative stability, which the Crown in Madrid rewarded with greater administrative attention. Mapping the island was part of that effort: the Carta de Cuba codified Spain’s knowledge of its domain, aiding defense (fortress placement, naval planning) and governance (taxation, infrastructure). The dedication to young Queen Isabel II also marked this map as a gesture of fealty (“La Siempre Fiel” Cuba to the crown). In scholarship, the 1835 chart is viewed as the definitive Spanish map of Cuba in the 19th century.

Modern map historians note that it remained the standard reference well into the colonial period. For instance, cartographic authorities like Emilio Cueto have praised the work as a masterful example of Spanish cartography in the Americas (often calling it the Carta de Vives and a “masterpiece” of Spanish chart-making). Warren Heckrotte likewise emphasizes that it was essentially the first complete topographical survey of Cuba. In sum, this map occupies an important place in Caribbean mapping history: it culminated nearly a century of Spanish charting of Cuba and influenced later maps of the region.  

Rarity

The map is extremely rare.

OCLC locates copies at Stanford, Harvard and Spanish Ministry of Defense.

We locate 1 sale of the map in the past 25 years (PBA - Warren Heckrotte Sale, 2016, sold for $15,500).