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Extremely rare chart of the channel between England and the Low Countries, from the 1652 edition of Blaeu's Zeespiegel, one of the rarest of all Sea Atlases of the 17th Century.
The map extends from Amsterdam and the Islands to the north, south to Cales and Duijnkerken and from Crommer and aHasebergh to Dover and Sandwich, with extensive soundings. This chart was the first chart in book three, and as such includes the half-title of for the atlas on its verso.
Willem Janszoon Blaeu (1571-1638) was a prominent Dutch geographer and publisher. Born the son of a herring merchant, Blaeu chose not fish but mathematics and astronomy for his focus. He studied with the famous Danish astronomer Tycho Brahe, with whom he honed his instrument and globe making skills. Blaeu set up shop in Amsterdam, where he sold instruments and globes, published maps, and edited the works of intellectuals like Descartes and Hugo Grotius. In 1635, he released his atlas, Theatrum Orbis Terrarum, sive, Atlas novus.
Willem died in 1638. He had two sons, Cornelis (1610-1648) and Joan (1596-1673). Joan trained as a lawyer, but joined his father’s business rather than practice. After his father’s death, the brothers took over their father’s shop and Joan took on his work as hydrographer to the Dutch East India Company. Later in life, Joan would modify and greatly expand his father’s Atlas novus, eventually releasing his masterpiece, the Atlas maior, between 1662 and 1672.
![[ London ] Londinum Feracis: Ang. Met.](https://storage.googleapis.com/raremaps/img/small/74642.jpg)
