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Description

Champlain's Largest and Most Accurate Map. "The first [map] to depict the existence of the entire Great Lakes network" - Burden (237). 

A beautiful example of Samuel de Champlain's 1632 large two-sheet map of eastern North America. A foundational map that deserves a host of accolades: it is the largest and most detailed of Champlain's maps; it is the first map to depict the entire Great Lakes network; it is the first delineation of present-day New York City on a printed map.

This is Burden's second state, of three states, with the circular unstippled area in the Grand Banks off Newfoundland.

This is one of the three great maps by Samuel de Champlain, the others being his Carte géographique de la Nouvelle Franse faicte / par le Sieur de Champlain Saint Tongeois Cappitaine ordinaire pour le Roy en la Marine, faict len 1612  (Burden 160) and his Carte geographique de la Nouvelle franse en son vray moridia, also from 1612 (Burden 161).

The present map is the largest of Champlain's maps; it is almost 40% larger than his Carte... Nouvelle Franse faicte... from 1612. This, his new map, extends the scope of Champlain's earlier cartography to the south, below Chesapeake Bay; west, to Lake Superior (Grand lac.); and north, further into the Canadian arctic west of Hudson's Bay (MER DU NORT GLACIALLE.)  The map is large enough that it needed to be printed from two copper plates on two sheets of laid paper (here joined as one, as usual).

The First Illustration of New York City

Near present-day Manhattan Island, the map bears the symbol of a tall, fortified building with a flag at the top of its spire, usually said to be a church. Burden (237) notes this “must be construed as the first delineation of present day New York City on a printed map.” A related label reads: "Habitation de Sauvages maniganaticouoit." This can be roughly interpreted as "Dwellings of the Maniganaticouoit [Manhattoe, Wecquaesgeek, or Canarsee?] Indians." The New York-area ethnonyms of the 1630s are rather complicated, as the Dutch referred to the local tribes by names that they themselves apparently did not use.

In his Iconography of Manhattan Island, Stokes notes of the symbol at New York:

...east of the Hudson, is found the curious designation "Habitation de sauvages maniganaticouoit." /  Manhattan Island does not appear, neither is there any indication of the presence of the Dutch; but, near the extremity of the eastern bank of the Hudson, opposite Long Island, is the very clear representation of a church. This representation, which differs from any other on the map, may perhaps be intended to indicate a Christian settlement; the publication of the map antedates by at least a year the erection of the first distinct church edifice on Manhattan Island.

Clearly, it is easy to become hung-up on the church-or-not-church question, when in reality that is quite trivial. What is certain is that Champlain knew of, and here represented, a fortified European settlement at the tip of Manhattan (founded by the Dutch in 1625) in the vicinity of a tribe that he knew to be called "maniganaticouoit". Thus we have for the first time a clear indication of the settlement that would grow into New York City as well as a very early allusion to the etymology of Manhattan Island.

Champlain in New France from 1629 - 1635

Burden provides the following summary of the last period of Champlain's life:

The intervening years since Champlain's last publication were not occupied with personal exploration, that part of his life was over. His young wife Helene came over to Quebec in 1620 and abhorred the place from the start. She remained four years and returned in 1624 to Paris, never to go back. In 1625 the first of the Jesuit priests arrived that were to have a great influence on the knowledge of the interior in future years. In 1627 hostilities began between England and France, and Acadia was taken by the English soon after. The English under David Kirke arrived in the St. Lawrence River the following year and laid siege. Champlain managed to bluff his way to the winter. In 1629 however they returned and had little choice but to surrender and accept transport back to Europe. He immediately started working tirelessly for the return of the territories to France. The Treaty of Saint Germain en Laye signed in March 1632 achieved this for the small price of payment of an old debt. King Louis XIII owed the English crown 600,000 ecus as a dowry for his sister Henrietta Maria when she married Charles I. Champlain returned to Quebec in 1633 and was never to see France again. He suffered a stroke in October 1635, and died on Christmas Day. At that time Quebec could claim just 200 people, whereas the English colonies numbered already many thousands. The French were just not interested in the New World as a place to colonise. The English, however, were full of it; books, poems, and plays talked of little else and were very positive about life there.

Provenance

W. Graham Arader III, circa 1978;
Dietrich American Foundation, acquired from the above;
Purchased in partnership with Boston Rare Maps in 2021

Condition Description
Two sheets joined as one. Small thin sliver of paper (less than 1 inch by a ½ inch, at 277 Long. and 53 Lat.) reinstated in expert facsimile. Margin trimmed close at the right edge (just touching the 44 latitude number), expertly extended. At the left side the margin has been extended from outside the neatline, recovering a small amount of area that was trimmed when bound.
Reference
Alden/Landis 640/62; Church 446; Burden, The Mapping of North America 237; JCB 2:281; Sabin 11840