Oblong folio, (309 x 398 mm). Engraved title page, 4 letterpress indexes, 112 engraved maps. Contemporary green morocco gilt, blue silk endpapers, extremities worn with minor loss, some surface wear. Some occasionally spotting and damp, else a fresh and clean example.

The portulan is comprised of 112 maps of the West Indies and coastal South America, divided in four parts: Antilles, 15 maps including the Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico, Saint Thomas, Antigua, Martinique, Trinidad and Tobago; Colombia, Florida, Bahamas and the Gulf of Mexico, 41 maps (including maps of Saint Augustine, Tampa, Pensacola); Cuba, 34 maps; Haiti and Jamaica, 22 maps. The maps show harbor soundings, coastal elevations and names of capes, points, islands, structures of port cities, and other geographical points of interest.

The publication of the Portulano was a significant event in the history of Spanish map-making, the Direccion de Hidrografia was established in 1797 as a single governmental organism in charge of coordinating hydrographical works and cartographic production, it lasted until the 20th century; Spain, forever weary of enemy states getting a hold of their navigational charts and cartographic discoveries, was not keen on issuing maps of their colonies. This Portulano is one of the first publications of its kind by the Spanish government, prior to this, navigational maps from the Malaspina expedition had been issued –after Galiano y Valdes, Churruca, Langara, amongst others-, but that was about it. This was the first time a significant corpus of maps was issued on the North American colonies. It was prepared under the supervision of Ferrer y Cafranga.

Streeter 1043B and 1044B cites these maps as the first separately engraved maps of Galverston Bay and St. Bernardo Bay (Bahia de Galvez Town and Bahia de S. Bernardo [Matagorda]). Streeter locates only one copy of the atlas (The library of Congress).

Rarity: 6 institutional copies located in OCLC (New York Public Library, Library of Congress, University of Miami, Southern Methodist University, University of Texas, British Library), no copy in Spain, not in JCB.

“For a copy of the complete atlas to appear on the market is a minor miracle. I’ve only seen this complete atlas once before, and it was this copy, which came from a private collector in Mexico in the 1960s.” (Dorothy Sloan).

Provenance: sold at Christie’s 2006, London.

Palau 233681; Philips Atlases 1223. Streeter 1043B and 1044B.