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Description

Scarce and highly important Portuguese sea chart of the coastline of rounding Cape Horn and showing the east coast of Africa, the Arabian Peninsula and India, published by Thevenot in his Relations de divers Voyages.

This scarce portolan style sea chart is based on a 1649 portolan chart by the royal cosmographer of Portugal, Joao Teixeira. Thevenot's compilation of voyages and charts was among the most important of its period, with an influence in France comparable to the earlier compilations by Linschoten (in Holland) and Haklyut (in England).

Joao Teixeira was one of a renowned Lisbon chart making family and prepared this chart in manuscript form, the best representation of the area in 1649, for use by Portuguese ships. However, it did not appear in print until Melchisedech Thevenot published this version of the map in his highly important compilation of Voyages around the world.

Thevenot's map reflects the Portuguese knowledge of the nautical routes between the Cape of Good Hope, Arabia, and Goa, then the center of Portuguese power in India and the chief link to trade with Spice Islands.

Norwich said of this chart, "It is extremely important and its excellence and value are indicated that, more than a century after its compilation, the great cartographer d'Anville (as noted by the geographer Viscount de Santarem) utilized Teixeira substantially for his chart of 1761."

The chart also includes insets of the key trading posts and harbors at Mombasa, Mozambique and Sofala, as well as a detail chart of the island of Socotra, the primary Portuguese trading points after rounding the Cape of Good Hope en route to India.