Boston Rare MapsSpecializing in antique American maps & prints
![Johannes van Keulen , Pas-Kaart Vande Zee Kusten van Niew Nederland Anders Genaamt Niew York
. Amsterdam, [1684/ca. 1702.]](https://bostonraremaps.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/BRM1914-Van-Keulen-Niew-Nederland-1-scaled-e1644343079376-150x150.jpg)
Van Keulen’s important chart of the waters off New York and southern New England, much enhanced by its detailed treatment of coastal settlement and inset charts of the Hudson and Connecticut Rivers. The main chart depicts the coast from Rensselaer Hook in New Jersey to roughly the “elbow” of Cape Cod, with extensive soundings and notations […]
A landmark in the mapping of Massachusetts, being the first large-scale chart of Plymouth Bay and environs. This chart depicts the waters of Plymouth Bay, with its distinctive geography marked by two long barrier beaches. The hydrographic data includes tidal data and soundings along the channels into Plymouth and the Jones and Duxbury Rivers. The […]
A nice example of what was for its time the finest chart of the coasts of New Hampshire and southern Maine. It was issued in 1776 in The Atlantic Neptune, an atlas of the East Coast used by British captains during the Revolution. The charts were so respected that they remained in use for decades, often […]
A rare Harvard commencement broadside issued in 1778 while the Revolutionary War was raging, with interesting features suggesting the prevalence at the College of patriotic and republican sentiments. Though the broadside makes no mention of the fact, Harvard had canceled its public commencement ceremony for 1778, as it had every year since the uproar in […]
A rare American chart of the waters off Cape Cod, Martha’s Vineyard and Nantucket. Chart from New York to Timber Island Including Nantucket Shoals was engraved and first published in 1791 by John Norman, Boston’s most notable post-war map engraver. It is usually found in Norman’s American Pilot, one of the earliest atlases published in […]
![Osgood Carleton, AN ACCURATE MAP of THE COMMONWEALTH OF MASSACHUSETTS Exclusive of the DISTRICT of MAINE Compiled pursuant to an ACT of the GENERAL COURT From Actual Surveys of the several Towns, &c.... Boston: Published and Sold by O. Carleton & J. Norman, [1798.]](https://bostonraremaps.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/BRM3522-Carleton_Norman-Massachusetts-1798_lowres-scaled-e1603477420533-150x150.jpg)
A great rarity, this seminal map by Osgood Carleton is by far the best 18th-century map of Massachusetts and one of the earliest officially-sponsored maps of an American state. With extensive expert restoration and priced accordingly, but all-but unobtainable in any condition. The map’s large scale of six miles to the inch gave mapmaker Osgood […]
![[ Profanity ] Commonwealth of Massachusetts. In the Year of our LORD, one thousand seven hundred and ninety eight. An Act to prevent profane Cursing and Swearing. [Boston: Young & Minns, 1798 (imprint supplied by Evans).]](https://bostonraremaps.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/BRM3638-Cursing-and-Swearing-1798_lowres-scaled-e1603817570507-150x150.jpg)
A scarce 1798 Massachusetts broadside transmitting a new law outlawing profanity and specifying procedures for prosecution and fines to be levied upon conviction. Section I of the Act specifies progressively larger fines to be levied upon repeated instances of profanity, “one moiety of the several forfeitures, aforesaid, to be to the use of the poor […]
![Anonymous, VIOLENT STORM. Boston, October 15, 1804. Boston, [late October] 1804.](https://bostonraremaps.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/BRM2131-Violent-Storm-in-Boston-1804-2-scaled-e1585253629539-150x150.jpg)
An unrecorded variant of an extremely rare broadside recounting the remarkable snow hurricane of 1804. The 1804 storm raged in Boston from Tuesday, October 9-Thursday, October 11, and observers were shocked by both its high winds and early-season snow: “The 1804 Snow hurricane was the first tropical cyclone in recorded history known to produce snowfall. An […]
A most important 1826 map of New England by Nathan Hale, being the first significant large-scale map of New England issued in the 19th century. As such, it is best viewed as the successor to Thomas Jefferys’ Map of the Most Inhabited Part of New England (1755), the great regional map of the 18th century. […]
An early and very rare broadside advertisement promoting a Boston-Albany rail connection. The railroad craze came relatively early to Massachusetts. By the late 1820s a number of lines had been proposed, including the Boston & Worcester Railroad and a Western Railroad linking Worcester and Albany. Backers hoped the legislature would step in and fund the projects for the greater good. This […]