Boston Rare MapsSpecializing in antique American maps & prints
The scarce first edition of La Nuova Francia, the first map to focus on New England and northeastern North America and to name “New France.” This remarkable map was compiled by Giacomo Gastaldi for Giovanni Ramusio’s Navigationi et Viaggi, the third volume of which focused on American explorations. It reflects Gastaldi’s attempt to synthesize information […]
An important, rare and very unusual map of North America and the Caribbean, extracted by Blaeu from his landmark West Indische Paskaert to meet a publishing deadline. The Insulae Americanae depicts eastern North America, much of Central America, part of Latin America, and the islands of the Caribbean. The brightly-painted arms of the Netherlands, England […]
A complete and uncut sheet of 17th-century geographic playing cards published in Paris by Pierre du Val likely for educational use. The game includes 52 cards arranged in the usual four suits, each dedicated to a continent: hearts to Europe, diamonds to Asia, spades to Africa, and clubs to the Americas. Each card features a […]
![Nicholas Visscher, NOVI BELGII NOVAEQUE ANGLIAE NEC NON PARTIS VIRGINIAE TABULA
. [Amsterdam, ca. 1684.]](https://bostonraremaps.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/brm2003-visscher-novi-belgii-e1440888373548-147x150.jpg)
A superb example of Nicholas Visscher‘s Novi Belgii, an iconic map of the New Netherlands, New England, Pennsylvania and parts of Maryland and Virginia. This is one of the most important entrants in the “Jansson-Visscher” series of maps, many variants of which were issued over the course of more than a century. The sequence began with a Joannes Jansson map of […]
This important work provides crucial information on eastern New York and southern New England. The main chart depicts the coast from Rensselaer Hook in New Jersey to roughly the “elbow” of Cape Cod, with extensive soundings and notations of shoals and other hazards. Much detail is given for Long Island Sound, Narragansett Bay and the waters […]
![John Thornton, Rob[er]t Morden and Phillip Lea, A NEW MAP OF NEW ENGLAND NEW YORK NEW IARSEY PENSILVANIA MARYLAND AND VIRGINIA. London, ca. 1685.](https://bostonraremaps.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/brm0975-thornton-ne-ny-nj-pa-md-va-1685-150x150.jpg)
The rare first obtainable state of the finest general map of England’s American colonies to date. This most important map is one of the earliest to adopt Augustine Herrman’s cartography for Virginia and Maryland. To the North it includes one of the earliest depictions of the Pennsylvania colony (est. 1681), the first printed chart of […]
In 1638, the General Court of the Plymouth Colony granted a group of settlers the rights to a new town named Taunton, the validity of which grant was confirmed by Wampanoag Sachem Massasoit. In 1664 Massasoit’s son and successor Metacomet-more familiar to us as “King Philip”–confirmed that grant in writing, with his interpreter John Sassamon […]
Published around 1700, this Kriegs Spiel, or “The War Game,” is a scarce and attractive sheet of playing cards designed to educate young people in the elements of conducting a military campaign. The sheet comprises 53 engraved panels numbered sequentially. All but one is a playing card using the French suits, each bearing an illustration of a military maneuver or fortification […]
A considerable rarity, and the most detailed chart of Boston Harbor for its time. The chart depicts Boston Harbor from modern-day Winthrop in the north to Hull and Hingham in the south. It provides an immense amount of information for these complicated waters, including the many harbor islands, hundreds of soundings, and a multitude of rocks […]
The earliest printed chart of Casco Bay, based on the surveys of Cyprian Southack, one of early New England’s most energetic and interesting figures. Cyprian Southack Southack was born in London in 1662 and emigrated to Boston in 1685. A man of enormous energy, he was active for decades as a privateer, naval captain, navigator, […]