[First Edition of 1587 Mercator World Map] Στράβωνος Γεωγραφικῶν βιβλοὶ ιζʹ. Strabonis Rerum Geographicarum Libri XVII. [with] Isaaci Casauboni Commentarius et Castigationes ad lib. [with map:] Orbis Terrae Compendiosa Descriptio Quam ex Magna Universali Mercatoris . . . MDLXXXVII

With Rumold Mercator's Condensed Version of His Father's Famous World Map Isaac Casaubon s celebrated Geneva 1587 edition of Strabo s Geography, with the first appearance of Rumold Mercator's version of his fat. Folio. Two parts in one volume. Bound to style in full antique calf, gilt-tooled, with single-fillet panel and mitred corners on the boards enclosing a gilt arabesque center medallion; all edges gilt. Spine richly gilt with oval arabesque and scrolling tools, the title stamped in an oval cartouche. [8], 602; [10], 223 pages. Titles within historiated woodcut borders. Text printed in Greek and Latin in double columns. Engraved folding map. Complete. Small 19th-century stamp in lower margin of first titlepage and on lower margin of final leaf in volume. Leaves with mellow age-toning and minimal light scattered foxing. With Rumold Mercator's Condensed Version of His Father's Famous World Map Isaac Casaubon s celebrated Geneva 1587 edition of Strabo s Geography, with the first appearance of Rumold Mercator's version of his father's great world map of 1569. The map is based on Gerard Mercator s celebrated 1569 world map and was made while Gerard was still alive (1512-1594). This is the only realistically obtainable world map with direct input from Gerard Mercator, the greatest geographer of his era. Both his 1538 and 1569 world maps are unobtainable rarities. Rumold s reduction - praised by Shirley as a model of clarity and neatness, with characteristic cursive sea-name lettering - became the prototype for later Mercator atlas maps. This map would be continuously used in editions of Mercator's Atlas well into the 17th-century. By the 1620s the plate became damaged, with cracks appearing in late impressions. The present 1587 map is readily distinguishable from the later atlas editions dating from the beginning of the seventeenth century, which include first one and then two cracks in the copperplate, both in the title. After the text was changed below the image in 1595, it was thereafter discontinued in editions after 1603. The present work is a reduced version of the 1569 wall map of the world, on which the revolutionary Mercator Projection was introduced. Oddly, this folio version recast the map into a double-hemisphere format; Rumold chose not to employ his father s namesake projection. To the left is the western hemisphere. The prominent bulge in South America, a characteristic introduced by Gerard Mercator and evident on his 1569 world map, has been retained here. Tierra del Fuego forms part of a gigantic southern continent that continues in the eastern hemisphere. At the north pole, two of the four islands that Gerard Mercator thought surrounded the pole are evident. There is also a suggestion of a Northwest Passage via the Straits of Anian. Anian derives from Ania, a Chinese province on a large gulf mentioned in Marco Polo s travels (ch. 5, book 3). The gulf Polo described was actually the Gulf of Tonkin, but the province s description was transposed from Vietnam to the northwest coast of North America. The first map to do so was Giacomo Gastaldi s world map of 1562, followed by Zaltieri and Mercator. The Strait then became shorthand for a passage to China, i.e. a Northwest Passage. It appeared on maps until the mid-eighteenth century. Quivira, south of Anian, refers to the Seven Cities of Gold sought by the Spanish explorer Francisco Vasquez de Coronado in 1541. In 1539, Coronado wandered over what today is Arizona and New Mexico, eventually heading to what is now Kansas to find the supposedly rich city of Quivira. Although he never found the cities or the gold, the name stuck on maps of southwest North America, wandering from east to west. In the eastern hemisphere, Japan appears as a large round island. The islands of Southeast Asia are arr.…