Antique Engraving of Blaeu's first Map of Brazil, Circa 1640

Name: Antique Engraving of Blaeu's first Map of Brazil, Circa 1640
Brand: Blaeu
SKU: BGPB-003
Price: 1565 USD
Availability: InStock

$1,565

€1,400 · dollar price at today's exchange rate

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Shipping to the United States: $51 standard, $73 express, insured and tracked.

Date: 1640
Maker: Blaeu
Kind: Maps
Size: 49 × 58 cm (19.3 × 22.8 in)
Condition: Good. Wear consistent with age and use. Original/contemporary hand coloring. Shows wear and soiling. Original folding line, Latin text on verso. Please study image carefully.
Period: Colonial America
Places: Brazil
Reference: BGPB-003

What the condition grades mean

Excellent: Bright and clean, with no faults worth mentioning.
Very good: Only light signs of age, such as faint toning.
Good: Normal signs of age for a sheet of this period: toning, some foxing, small marks or neat old repairs.
Fair: Clear faults such as staining, tears or repairs, priced to match.

Every fault we see is written in the condition note, and the whole sheet is shown uncropped in the photos.

Guaranteed original. This is an original of the period stated, not a later reproduction or print-on-demand copy. If it is ever shown to be otherwise, we refund you in full.

Shipping to the United States. Sent from our gallery in Langweer, the Netherlands, flat between boards or rolled in a tube, and fully insured. Delivery and import charges.

About this piece

Blaeu's first map of Brazil, an original antique engraving titled "Novus Brasiliae Typus", published in Amsterdam and dated to about 1640, with original color. The imprint "Amstelodami Guiljelmus Blaeu excudit" appears at the lower right.

The map is turned with north to the right, so the coast of Brazil runs across the sheet with the sea, labeled "Mar del Nort", along the bottom. The captaincies are named along the shore, including S. Vincente, Rio de Janeiro, Spirito Santo, Porto Seguro, Bahia and Pernambuco. The interior is filled with vignettes of native life and animals, among them a fire scene with cannibalism, a hut and figures, a tapir and other beasts. Inset within a decorative border at the top is a small plan of the "Baya de todos Sanctos". In the sea are a galleon, a whale and monsters, and two compass roses mark the rhumb lines. The large title cartouche at the lower left is flanked by a male and a female Brazilian, both shown naked.

Willem Janszoon Blaeu (1571 to 1638), a Dutch geographer and publisher, studied with Tycho Brahe, set up shop in Amsterdam as a maker of instruments and globes, and in 1635 released his atlas Theatrum Orbis Terrarum, sive, Atlas novus.

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