Sir Robert Dudley (1574-1649), Extremely Scarce First Edition of the First Sea Chart Focused on California

Robert Dudley. CARTA PRIMA GENERALE D'AMERICA DELL' INDIA OCCIDENTALE È MARE DEL ZUR. [Florence]: [Francesco Onofri], [1646]. First state with "6" in the top left corner and lacking the additional "Lº.2º.XV." in the title cartouche. A double-page copperplate engraving by Antonio Francesco Lucini; from the second part of Dudley's atlas Arcano del Mare; the map featuring the southern tip of California, Central America, and part of South America, along with southern Florida and the Caribbean; with inset map "America Maiestrale" on the left, including the coast of California with the interesting insertion of Golfo Profondo, and numerous place names such as Mendocino, Monterey ("Moneerei"), and San Diego; includes a compass rose, sailing ship, italic calligraphy, and title cartouche; presented matted and in a lovely wooden frame. Burden 266; Phillips Atlases 457.

Sight size 18 1/4 x 27 1/4 in.; Sheet size 19 1/2 x 28 3/4 in. (at widest); Frame dimensions 26 x 34 3/4 in.

From the Collection of Priscilla Schavran, Holly Springs, North Carolina

Sir Robert Dudley was an English cartographer, explorer, and ship builder, and the son of the 1st Earl of Leicester. He settled in Florence, Italy, where he worked for most of his life, and in his 70s he published the Arcano del Mare (The Secret of the Sea), the first sea atlas to include the entire globe. Unique and important in many ways, his atlas is especially well-known for the time-consuming and spectacular engraved charts by Lucini with engravings that Burden states "represent the finest of Italian capabilities." Burden notes, too, that the atlas was "the first printed English nautical atlas," "[a]rguably the most sumptuous ever produced," and that it "was the first atlas to use Mercator's projection throughout, and the earliest to show the prevailing winds, currents and magnetic deviation."

Burden also explains the undeniable importance of this particular map: "This is the first printed sea chart of the Californian coastline and draws upon the voyage of Sebastián Vizcaino in 1602.... It was to be the last voyage for sometime to explore this coast; its most important development was the name of Monterey, Pº: di Moneerei" (The Mapping of North America, pgs. 338-339).

Two sheets joined as one, as issued; sheet with foxing; vertical and horizontal fold lines, including one horizontal fold with areas of separation, small chips, a few small damp stains, and browning; tear from left margin just merging into border of inset map; minor creasing; a study of the verso shows margins trimmed short with a portion of the left margin left wide; attached at upper edge with two strips of tape on verso; not laid down.