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Highly detailed plan of Canton (Guangzhou), looking from the water toward the city.
Includes a number of monuments and a bustling coastline, but no formal docks of any size.
A key at the top left identifies the major points of interest.
Johan Nieuhof ( 1618 - 1672) was a Dutch traveler who wrote about his journeys to Brazil, China and India. The most famous of these was a trip from Canton to Peking in 1655-1657, which enabled him to become an authoritative Western writer on China.
Nieuhof was initially employed in Brazil to explore the regions between Maranhão and the São Francisco Rivers, where he made a particular study of the neighborhood of Pernambuco. He left Brazil in 1649, after the Portuguese victory in the Second Battle of Guararapes. Upon his return, Nieuhof joined the service of the Dutch East India Company (VOC). In service of the VOC he spent several years in Batavia. In 1654, he was appointed to participate in an embassy to meet with the relatively new Qing emperor China, under Peter de Goyer and Jacob de Keyser, in order to gain trading rights on China's southern coast. While unsuccessful, Niehof used his time in China to compile one of the definitive works of the period.
![[ Sichuan and Shaanxi ] Suchuen et Xensi, Provincia seu Praefecturae Regni Sinensis . . .](https://storage.googleapis.com/raremaps/img/small/95627.jpg)
![[Hainan] A Chart of the South Coast of Hay-Nan from Tinhosa to Guichou. Survey'd in 1776 and 77. By Capn. Haldane.](https://storage.googleapis.com/raremaps/img/small/77686.jpg)