Excellent Dutch Atlas with Nice Original Color
With La Floride Map Showing Florida and Texas
An early Covens & Mortier reissue of Pieter van der Aa's Nouvel Atlas, which was first published in Leiden in 1714. The firm of Covens & Mortier acquired many of Van der Aa's plates after his death in 1733. The present atlas contains 101 maps with Van der Aa's imprint still intact and not yet replaced with that of Covens & Mortier (as in a later reissue). All of the maps in the present atlas still have the original van der Aa text: Suivant les Nouvelles Observations de Messrs. de l'Academie Royale des Sciences. etc. Augmentées de Nouveau. A Leide. Chez Pierre van der Aa. Only the title and the register make mention of Covens & Mortier.
Outstanding maps:
L'Amerique Septentrionale.
A nice example of the Covens & Mortier edition of one of De L'Isle's most influential (and subsequently copied) maps. Shows North America with colonial divisions and blank slate for the Northwest. The Southeast is shown as Floride and the Southwest as Nouveau Mexique. The mouth of the Mississippi is pushed considerable west of its true location. Quivira placed in the Midwest. Alta and and Baja California are simply labeled contiguously as Californie. A few places noted along the California coast: Nouvelle Albion, Village des Canots, Seyo, P. des Sardines, Sierra Nevada, and San Diego. An odd gulf opening midway down the Pacific coast of Baja California near Isla de Cedros is labeled: Golfe qui n'a pas encore ete bien decouvert. The routes of Cortez in 1534, Drake's route, D'Olivier's route in 1600, Gaeten's route in 1542 and Mendana's route are shown off California. Excellent detail throughout. Names the Apaches Peuples, Apaches de navaio and other Indian Tribes. Important early Great Lakes configuration. A bit of repair in the upper margin, well outside the map and a minor repair in the bottom margin, just touching the printed image. Overall a very nice example, with a stunning cartouche.
La Floride.
Vander Aa's rare and highly desirable map of the Florida, Texas and the Southern portion of what would become the United States.
This version retains the original La Floride title, in a later issue the title is changed to La Louisiane.
The map shows the early English and Spanish settlements, including St. Augustine, Indian Lands, mountains, rivers, as they were then known to exist in the early part of the 18th century.
Dozens of place names along the eastern seaboard and the Gulf Coast. Nice detail in Mississippi Valley region and Texas. The Mississippi is pushed far west of its true course. An apocryphal Apalachicola River runs nearly due north to what would probably be Kentucky. Based on De L'Isle's seminal map.
Canada ou Nouvelle France.
Based on Delisle's important map of 1703, this map shows northeastern North American and the Great Lakes region. The Great Lakes are reasonably well delineated, but other parts of the map will appear distorted to modern-day eyes: particularly odd is the Mississippi River basin. Lahontan's mythical Riviere Longue is shown linking a large western lake with the Mississippi River. It is thought that the lake's origin is derived from Indian stories concerning the Great Salt Lake. The map is filled with place names, Native American tribes and interesting notations. The handsomely illustrated title cartouche is surrounded by scenes of Native Americans and indigenous American animals.
Mappe-Monde.
A beautiful double-hemispheric world map, with detailed allegorical vignettes symbolizing the four continents, one in each of the corners of the sheet. The map traces the routes of several sixteenth century explorers in the Pacific and Indian Oceans, including Magellan, Tasman, Chevalier de Chermont, Mendana and others. The western coastline of New Zealand is illustrated, along with parts of Australia and Tasmania. Above peninsular California, the entire northwest coast of North America is blank. There is a remnant of the coastline that seems to suggest a connection between North America and Asia, here with a notation mentioning the discoveries of Vasco de Gama: Coste decouverte par Don Jean de Gama.
Covens & Mortier was one of the largest and most successful publishing firms in Dutch history and continued in business for over a century. Pierre Mortier the Elder (1661-1711) had obtained a privilege in 1690 to distribute the works of French geographers in the Netherlands. After his widow continued the business for several years, Cornelis (1699-1783) took over in 1719.
In 1721, Mortier forged a partnership with Johannes Covens (1697-1774), who had recently married Cornelis’ sister. They published under the joint name of Covens & Mortier. In 1774, upon the death of his father, Johannes Covens II (1722-1794) took over his father’s share. In 1778, the company changed its name to J. Covens & Zoon, or J. Covens & Son.
Covens II’s son, Cornelis (1764-1825), later inherited the business and brought Petrus Mortier IV back into the fold. Petrus was the great-grandson of Petrus Mortier I. From 1794, the business was called Mortier, Covens & Zoon, or Mortier, Covens, & Son.
The business specialized in publishing French geographers including Deslisle, Jaillot, Janssonius, and Sanson. They also published atlases, for example a 1725 reissue of Frederik de Wit’s Atlas Major and an atlas, with additions, from the works of Guillaume Delisle. There were also Covens & Mortier pocket atlases and town atlases. The company profited from acquiring plates from other geographers as well. For example, the purchased Pieter van der Aa’s plates in 1730. Finally, they also compiled a few maps in house. At their height, they had the largest collection of geographic prints ever assembled in Amsterdam.
Pieter van der Aa (1659-1733) was a Dutch mapmaker and publisher who printed pirated editions of foreign bestsellers and illustrated books, but is best known for his voluminous output of maps and atlases. Van der Aa was born to a German stonecutter from Holstein. Interestingly, all three van der Aa sons came to be involved in the printing business. Hildebrand was a copper engraver and Boudewyn was a printer.