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Description

Fine original antique map of Northern Italy, showing the region from Turin to Parma and centered on Milan. This fine map was published by Frederick De Wit in Amsterdam at the end of the seventeenth century, at a time when much of the region was controlled by the Hapsburgs.

The map extends to the Genoese coastline, showing Savonola and Rapallo. In the northwest, the Alps are shown. The finger lakes of northern Italy are attractively portrayed. A decorative and attractive cartouche appears in the upper right, showing cherubs as well as the coats of arms of Milan, Parma, and Montferrata.

Condition Description
Backed with wove paper. Minor soiling and toning, especially at the bottom edge near the centerfold. Some minor wear along centerfold. Side margins trimmed to neatline.
Frederick De Wit Biography

De Wit (1629 ca.-1706) was a mapmaker and mapseller who was born in Gouda but who worked and died in Amsterdam. He moved to the city in 1648, where he opened a printing operation under the name of The Three Crabs; later, he changed the name of his shop to The White Chart. From the 1660s onward, he published atlases with a variety of maps; he is best known for these atlases and his Dutch town maps. After Frederik’s death in 1706, his wife Maria ran the shop for four years before selling it. Their son, Franciscus, was a stockfish merchant and had no interest in the map shop. At the auction to liquidate the de Wit stock, most of the plates went to Pieter Mortier, whose firm eventually became Covens & Mortier, one of the biggest cartography houses of the eighteenth century.