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Description

Rarity & States

In Volume V of Monumenta Cartographica Neerlandica (page 80), Schilder proposes two candidate examples as possible first states of the 1608 Blaeu Asia; one in Switzerland (described thusly "Rittersaalverein, Burgdorf (Switzerland; mounted and stored in a paneled wooden locker)") and on at the BnF in Paris ("Bibliotheque Nationale, Paris (Ge C 4930 [ex Klaproth Collection, no. 745]; mounted)"). Both of these examples are comprised of only the four central cartographic sheets, having previously lost their side panels and text sheets. Per Schilder's census, there is only one known complete example of a Blaeu edition, dated 1612 in the imprint line in the far lower-right, at the Sächsisches Hauptstaatsarchiv, Dresden (Schr. II, Mappe 32 b, Nr. 3).

Sometime after 1612 but before 1625, the plates were acquired by Henricus Hondius, who published them in 1624. In that edition, the text has been reset and the imprint line changed, but the geographical plates appear to have been untouched. This raises an interesting point with respect to the Swiss and French examples noted by Schilder under his entry for the first state; if they lack side panels, it cannot be said if they were printed in 1608, 1612, or indeed 1624 by Hondius. Therefore, prior to the discovery of the present map, there was only one definitely attributable Blaeu edition of the map in the world, the example at the Sächsisches Hauptstaatsarchiv in Dresden.

A further piece of internal evidence suggests that no known copies of the map were printed in 1608; all known examples of the map have an inset of Arctic the caption for which makes reference to the Dutch expeditions there in 1594, '95, and '96 (Barentsz), as well as the expedition of 1609 (Henry Hudson).

A later state by Nicolaas Visscher is known in three examples. Schilder also notes two other Visscher states, one of which is known from a now-destroyed example, the other of which is hypothesized based on external evidence.

Willem Janszoon Blaeu Biography

Willem Janszoon Blaeu (1571-1638) was a prominent Dutch geographer and publisher. Born the son of a herring merchant, Blaeu chose not fish but mathematics and astronomy for his focus. He studied with the famous Danish astronomer Tycho Brahe, with whom he honed his instrument and globe making skills. Blaeu set up shop in Amsterdam, where he sold instruments and globes, published maps, and edited the works of intellectuals like Descartes and Hugo Grotius. In 1635, he released his atlas, Theatrum Orbis Terrarum, sive, Atlas novus.

Willem died in 1638. He had two sons, Cornelis (1610-1648) and Joan (1596-1673). Joan trained as a lawyer, but joined his father’s business rather than practice. After his father’s death, the brothers took over their father’s shop and Joan took on his work as hydrographer to the Dutch East India Company. Later in life, Joan would modify and greatly expand his father’s Atlas novus, eventually releasing his masterpiece, the Atlas maior, between 1662 and 1672.