Map Lower Egypt (5 results)

No Binding. Condition: Very Good. A fine Engraving - printed circa 1850. Mounted and ready to frame. Hand-colouring not contemporary but delicately and expertly executed. A fine opportunity to purchase an attractive and decorative engraved Map of Lower Egypt.

No Binding. Condition: Very Good. A fine engraving - printed circa 1850. Mounted and ready to frame. Hand colouring not contemporary, but delicately and expertly executed. A fine opportunity to purchase an attractive and decorative engraving - Map of Lower Egypt and the Coast of Alexandria.

1st Edition. Excellent. Very faint offsetting, else fine with generous margins. Size 7.5 x 9.5 Inches. This is Girolamo Ruscelli's 1561 map of Egypt. It is the second modern map of the Lower Nile, predated only by the 1548 Gastaldi map, upon which it is based. It is among the earliest acquirable maps to show the Nile Delta with contemporaneous information; it is also one of the first printed maps to depict the Egyptian Pyramids. A Closer Look Ruscelli's map follows the 1548 map of fellow Venetian Giacomo Gastaldi; the elegant engraving here was executed by Giulio Sanuto. It extends from the desert of Marmarica (eastern Libya) to the Sinai Peninsula and the northern part of the Red Sea. It is centered on the Nile River Delta; its southernmost placename on the Nile is Manfalut, still an extant placename. Many cities are noted, including Alexandria, Cairo, and Rosetta. At several points along the west bank of the Nile, pyramids are noted, not just the site of the Great Pyramids at Giza, but further south as well, perhaps corresponding to the Roman-era Qasr El-Farafra rather than more ancient Pyramids. Gastaldi's sources are unknown. Some features - such as the Torre de li Arabi , found to the west of Alexandria - appear in Medieval sources such as the c. 1320 Sanuto-Vesconte and the c. 1375 Catalan Atlas. But Gastaldi's overall presentation of the Nile Delta, replete with its modern placenames and placement of the Pyramids, has no known precursor. Considering Gastaldi's other Tabulae Modernae , his sources may have been Portuguese; certainly, the Portuguese were eagerly exploring northeastern Africa and the Nile during the early 16th century. Many of the placenames appear to be Latinizations of Arabic names, so it is also possible that Gastaldi had more direct reports. While a later derivative of the 1548 Gastaldi map, this Ruscelli has much to recommend it. Ruscelli's iteration of the map is twice the size of the Gastaldi, and Sanuto's engraving is far superior to that of the earlier work. Publication History and Census This map was engraved by Giulio Sanuto for inclusion in the 1561 first edition of La Geografia di Claudio Tolomeo . The first state can be recognized by a pressmark that runs off the top of the page, as here. Beginning in 1574, a second state of the plate appears, with a platemark running fully around the map. A third state appeared in 1598 with a new letterpress title and the addition of a sea monster and a sailing galley. Four examples of the separate map are listed in OCLC; the map does appear on the market from time to time. References: OCLC 165592081. Rumsey 11311.117 (1561).

Very good. Light soiling and foxing. Some wear to centerfold at bottom margin. Size 24 x 34 Inches. This is a c. 1822 Pierre Jacotin and Gratien Le Père map of Lower Egypt and the Nile River Delta, prepared for the monumental work Description de l'Égypte . A Closer Look The map covers the Nile River Delta in Lower Egypt, as far south as Cairo, Giza, Memphis, and Suez. The many tributaries, canals, lakes, and other waterways of the delta are labelled, along with a remarkable number of settlements, dried former waterways, ancient ruins, routes through the deserts on either side of the delta (including those taken by Napoleon's soldiers), caravanserai, churches and religious convents, mountains, and other features. Eleven scales of ancient and modern units of measure appear at bottom-left. The map's subtitle refers to an ancient canal (most often known as 'the Canal of the Pharaohs' and labelled here as 'Vestiges du Canal de Suez') starting east of the ancient city of Bubastis (here as 'Bubaste runiée'), that was an ancient forerunner to the Suez Canal. The Ancient Greeks believed that the canal was built by Senusret III (Sesostris to the Greeks), who ruled in the 19th century BCE (the Twelfth Dynasty of the Middle Kingdom), but it most likely was not built until over a millennium later, completed in the reign of Darius the Great (r. 550 - 486 BCE) during the era of Achaemenid rule of Egypt. Later rulers of Egypt, including the Ptolemaic Dynasty, the Roman emperors Trajan and Diocletian, and early Arabs attempted to maintain the canal, but it proved difficult to do so over an extended period of time due to its tendency to, like the Nile, silt up. When Napoleon invaded Egypt, he was keen on finding the remnants of the ancient canal and tasked a group of scientists, surveyors, and engineers with locating it, which they were able to do with some accuracy, with their findings, including this map, ending up in the Description de l'Égypte . For his part, Napoleon later considered building a modern canal linking the Mediterranean and Red Sea but was dissuaded by a common but mistaken belief that there was a significant difference in sea levels between the two. Napoleon in Egypt The French campaign in Egypt and Syria (1798 - 1801) was fought between the forces of Napoleon Bonaparte and Ottoman armies in Egypt and Syria. Napoleon proclaimed his invasion of Egypt to defend French trade interests and to complete a scientific study of the region. He also hoped that seizing Egypt and Syria would destabilize British influence in the region, weakening British access to India, and encourage an alliance with Tipu Sultan, who was actively fighting against the British in India. Despite initial military successes, the campaign floundered when British Admiral Horatio Nelson sunk the French fleet at the Battle of Aboukir Bay (1798). Without naval backup and resupply, the French forces were forced to fight a hard overland campaign that ultimately cost more than it gained and ended in the complete French withdrawal from Egypt. Where the campaign failed in its military ambitions, it was a great success scientifically. Military topographers completed the most sophisticated survey of Egypt yet undertaken. More than 60 civilian scholars and scientists, known popularly as 'the Savants', compiled archeological, botanical, geological, and zoological data. Most significantly, the expedition brought the Rosetta Stone to light, effectively creating the new field of Egyptology. Publication History and Census This map was prepared by army engineers Pierre Jacotin and Gratien Le Père during Napoleon's campaign in Egypt, then engraved for inclusion in the Description de l'Égypte a colossal and richly illustrated multivolume work published by the French government that gathered all the knowledge of the region's natural and human history, from antiquity to the then-present. The work was produced by a team of dozens of scholars and technical experts, as well as hu.

Very good; small areas of virtually invisible scuffing and worming. Size 15.5 x 20.5 Inches. This elegant map of Egypt, focusing on the Lower Nile and Eastern Mediterranean coast was printed in a single edition in 1588 for Livio and Giulio Sanuto's twelve-sheet 'atlas' of Africa. Of the 16th century maps focusing north Africa, Sanuto is unique. His depiction of the continent differed sharply from any contemporaneous map, the result of his thorough reconsideration of African geography in the light of both conventional and newly available sources - marking it as a unique and underappreciated masterpiece of geographical thought. Ancient Roots, Modern Fertilizer The Ptolemaic map focusing on this area - 'Tertia Africae Tabula' as it was titled in the 1478 Rome Ptolemy - figured in at least part of Sanuto's geographical calculus. A comparison of the linear, schematic formulation of the mountains embanking the lower Nile and the ranges depicted striking towards the Red Sea between 23° and 27° latitude is enough to draw the conclusion that Sanuto consulted Ptolemy. Even so, the placenames along the Nile are not, for the most part, Ptolemaic. There are features along the Nile unique to the present work, for example the eremitic cells of Saint Anthony and shire of Saint Paul the Anchorite. These are depicted on no other prior map we have seen. These saints were of particular importance in Coptic Christianity, and their holy sites may have been included in the reports of missions to Abyssinia (such as that of Francisco Álvares, which was consulted extensively by Sanuto for his maps of the Upper Nile.) The consistency of the geographical information on this map with Sanuto's map of Abyssinia - for example, in the meandering of the Nile upriver from Aswan, and into 'Barnagassi Regnum' - suggests that Álvares' information might have also impacted the present work. Sanuto's treatment of the deserts west of the Nile is sharply different from either Ptolemy, or Gastaldi. Some features - notably the lakes of Gaoga and Fons Solis , do survive from those sources. But the positioning of mountains, cities, and even forests are here unique. The forests depicted in the regions of Berdoa - southeastern Libya - appear on no other map. Further south, the large Gaoga Lacus is depicted much as it is on earlier maps - except that here, it is declared to be the primary source of the River Canagar (Senegal River). While this itself represents a gross error, it is a different gross error than other mapmakers of the 17th century, who conflated the Senegal with the Niger. We do not know the source of Sanuto's information on the Arab denizens of the Egyptian desert, but the sentiments of the map's comment - ' Arabes hoc in deserto degertes miserrime vivunt sunt vero proditores omnium totius fere terrarum orbis sclerosissimi. ' (' the most hardened traitors of almost the entire world ') - are such that one wonders who Sanuto's source on these Arabs might have been, and why their opinions were so negative. A Bright Light, Dimmed As published, Sanuto's work was the first such book dedicated solely to Africa. This was not the author's intent, as the work was but one volume of a 12-volume global geography. If Sanuto were to have applied the same fresh thought to other regions that he applied to Africa, the result would certainly have been an atlas to eclipse that of Ortelius. As it happened, Livio died in 1576 before producing the other volumes, likely a victim of the plague. The completed volume - the set of Africa maps - was published posthumously in 1588, in a single edition. Thus, despite the detail and beauty of Sanuto's Africa maps, they achieved scant recognition. Dutch Golden Age mapmakers instead copied Ortelius's less refined mapping. Improved maps of the African interior did not appear until the 1670s and 80s, with the work of Du Val, Ludolf, and Coronelli. Of Sanuto's work, Bifolco and Ronca offer high praise: .The description of Africa is the best o.