A Map of the British Empire in America with the French, Spanish and the Dutch Settlements adjacent thereto

POPPLE, Henry (d. 1743) - Johannes COVENS (1697-1774) & Cornelius MORTIER (1697-1783), publishers

Published by printed for John Covens and Cornelius Mortier, Amsterdam, 1742

About this Item

Copper-engraved map on four sheets, key map, sheet of harbor maps all hand-coloured in outline; 4 engraved views of Quebec, New York, Niagara Falls. Seven sheets, each 26 x 21 1/2 inches. An important association copy of the Covens and Mortier edition of the famous Popple map, annotated by Peter Wraxall: a man intimately associated with the establishment and setting of boundaries in colonial America. Henry Popple produced this map under the auspices of the Lord Commissioners of Trade and Plantations to help settle disputes arising from the rival expansions of English, Spanish and French colonies. "France claimed not only Canada, but also territories drained by the Mississippi and its tributaries - in practical terms, an area of half a continent" (Goss The Mapping of North America p.122.) The thrust of British mapmaking after 1718 was to establish her presence cartographically on the French. Hence the title "The British Empire in America."Nevertheless, in making the map, Popple used the best available geographical information: Colonel Barnwell's map of the southeast; De L'Isle's "Carte de la Louisiane"; Cadwallader Colden's map of the Iroquois nations, and seems to have come up with a map that did not please imperialistic British viewers as much as it did those who only wanted an accurate depiction. The result was and is a vast map of North America never before delineated in such detail, and a source of delight and intrigue. The map was eventually very successful and there were several editions. Babinksi notes that George Washington owned a copy of the Key map (Popple's abbreviated version) and Benjamin Franklin ordered two copies for the Pennsylvania Assembly in 1746 and another in 1752. The Popple and Mitchell (1755) maps were the most important maps of North America made in the 18th century and were widely known and referred to throughout the formation of the United States. This example is the second state of the edition published by Covens and Mortier in Amsterdam, circa 1742. Covens & Mortier was a highly respected Amsterdam map publishing firm, which, more than any of their colleagues, maintained the high standards established by the Dutch and French cartographers of the previous century. The seven page Popple map appeared in the Covens & Mortier edition of De l'Isle's Atlas Nouveau. The Covens and Mortier version of Popple offers in a rather more manageable and accessible form all the geographical and political material of the original, including the depiction of Wager's sea battle with the Spanish near Cartagena in 1707. The region in question, the Eastern half of North America and a portion of northern South America, is laid out on four sheets, which joined would be roughly 43 x 52 inches. Each sheet is titled with its content. In addition to this are three more sheets: the Key map, a sheet with four views: Mexico City, New York, Quebec and Niagara Falls, and a sheet with eighteen harbor and island plans from Annapolis Royal in Nova Scotia to Porto Bello in Panama. It is unusual to have the Key map, as it was frequently separated from the others and framed by itself. This copy is further individualized in that it is the Wraxall-Dunkin-Van Rensslaer copy. It originally belonged to and was annotated by Peter Wraxall (d. 11 July 1759). He was an Englishman, who settled in New York and became involved in the relations between the Colony and the Iroquois Confederacy, which was a critical element in Britain's rivalry with France, writing several reports on the history of relations between whites and Iroquois in New York. Wraxall was William Johnson's secretary and, in battle, aide-de-camp, for the first two years of the French and Indian War. The atlas from which this map was removed subsequently passed to Elizabeth Dunkin (d.1846, niece of Wraxall's wife Elizabeth), who gave it to her son-in-law John Sanders Van Rensslaer (1792-1868). Wraxall limits his annotations to the upper left sheet; he notes in the lower left corner. Seller Inventory # 21060

Bibliographic Details

Title: A Map of the British Empire in America with ...

Publisher: printed for John Covens and Cornelius Mortier, Amsterdam

Publication Date: 1742