Description
Striking example of the scarce English edition of Waghenaer's sea chart showing the coastlines of Northern Germany and Denmark.
The chart includes the modern cities of Greifswald, Stralsund, the island of Rugen, Barth, Wismar, Rostock, and Lubeck and Heiligenhafen, along the German Coastline, and Fehmarn, Rodbyhavn, Nysted, and Maribo, in the north.
The chart is richly embellished with compass roses, sea monsters, sailing ships, and rhumb lines.
Shirley says of the English Waghenaer:
"In 1588 Anthony Ashley, clerk to the Privy Council, was commissioned by Sir Christopher Hatton to prepare and English language version of... Waghenaer's... Spieghel der Zeevaerdt... For the English version new plates were engraved in England by Theodore de Bry, Jodocus Hondius, Augustine Ryther and Johannes Rutlinger... The plates were later acquired by Jodocus Hondius, who published another edition in 1695" (Shirley, British Library). Such was the popularity of this and other versions in English, that sea atlases became universally known as "waggoners".
Condition Description
Full old (possibly publisher's) hand-color. Oxidation of pigments, resultant offsetting.
Reference
Cf. Koeman, Wag 13.