Boston Rare MapsSpecializing in antique American maps & prints
![Ric[hard] Blome, A Draught of the Sea Coast and Rivers of Virginia, Maryland, and New England. Taken from the latest Surveys. London, [1672/1678].](https://bostonraremaps.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/BRM4171-Blome-VA-MD-New-England-1678_lowres-scaled-e1655143607540-150x150.jpg)
Richard Blome’s scarce, significant and rather charming map of the northern English colonies, and something of a landmark in the English cartography of its emerging empire in North America. This is one of four maps illustrating Richard Blome’s A Description of the Island of Jamaica; with the other Isles and Territories in America, to which […]
![John Seller, A Chart of the Coast of AMERICA from New found Land to Cape Cod by Iohn Seller Hyrographer [sic] to the king. [London: John Seller, ca.1674]](https://bostonraremaps.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/BRM3678-Seller-Coast-of-North-America-1674_lowres-150x150.jpg)
Very scarce chart of the coasts of New England and the Canadian Maritimes from John Seller’s Atlas Maritimus, the best depiction of the region then available. Published in 1674, at a transitional moment in the history of the English colonies in North America. The chart depicts the coast from eastern Long Island round to Newfoundland […]
![Nicolaas Jansz. Visscher, NOVI BELGII NOVÆQUE ANGLIÆ NEC NON PARTIS VIRGINIÆ TABULA multis in locis emendata ... [Amsterdam:] Nicolaas Jansz Visscher, [ca. 1656.]](https://bostonraremaps.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/BRM4113-Visscher-Novi-Belgii-1656_lowres-scaled-e1656693408456-150x150.jpg)
The earliest obtainable state of Visscher’s important promotional map of the New Netherlands and New England, composed for the Dutch West India Company. Also sought after for its fine inset prospect of Manhattan, the earliest obtainable view of what became New York City. Background Dutch interest in the region began with the formation of the […]
![[Willem Blaeu], NOVA BELGICA ET ANGLIA NOVA. [Amsterdam, 1635/1640]](https://bostonraremaps.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/BRM4082-Blaeu-Nova-Belgica_lowres-scaled-e1646421085449-150x150.jpg)
A lovely example of a most important map by Willem Blaeu, the 1635 Nova Belgica is a cartographic summation of European settlement and geographic knowledge of New England and the mid-Atlantic in the first quarter of the 17th century. This map is based largely on the seminal 1614 manuscript map by the Dutch trader Adrien […]
![Maurice Neumont / P.J. Gallais et Cie., Edit. Imp., En 1788 MIRABEAU disait deja : LA GUERRE est l’industrie Nationale de la PRUSSE [“Already in 1788 Mirabeau was saying: War is the national industry of Prussia.”] Paris, [1917.]](https://bostonraremaps.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/BRM3908-Neumont-La-Guerre...Prusse-1914_lowres-150x150.jpg)
A brilliantly-designed and brutally-effective First World War propaganda map by Maurice Neumont, comparing Germany to a monstrous octopus threatening Europe. Germany is shown in different shadings of red, indicating its numerous annexations of surrounding territory since 1740, the most recent being the 1871 seizure of Alsace-Lorraine during the Franco-Prussian War. Sprawled across Germany is a […]
A highly-decorative mid 19th century-style trade sign for an unidentified dealer in naval stores, charts and globes, with three superbly-detailed applied relief carvings of navigational instruments. This trade sign was constructed from old, evenly-patinated oak boards joined horizontally and cut to a “tombstone” shape, with a “kerf-cut” molding around the edges. To this the maker […]
![[Anonymous], ΧΑΡΤΗς ΤΗς ΜΕΔΒΑς [Map of Medaba]. [Jerusalem, ca. late 1897-1900?]](https://bostonraremaps.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/BRM3136-Madaba-map_lowres-150x150.jpg)
A rare and lovely manuscript based on the famed Madaba Map. One of the most spectacular cartographic relics of the ancient world, this enormous sixth-century mosaic floor map includes the earliest extant map of the Holy Land. Created in the late seventh century, the mammoth mosaic of the Middle East now known as the Madaba Map […]
A unique archive of maps and plans tracing reflecting decades of real estate speculation and development in the village of Siasconset, on Nantucket’s southeast shore. Nantucket manuscript material is vanishingly rare on the market, and it would be impossible to reproduce such a grouping today. Background After decades of great prosperity mid-18thcentury Nantucket entered a […]
![[Anonymous]. Devizes Prison BLOCK PLAN. [No place, ca. latter part 19th century.]](https://bostonraremaps.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/09/BRM3391-Devizes-Prison_lowres-150x150.jpg)
Fascinating 19th-century manuscript architectural plan of a Wiltshire prison on a revolutionary design, owing a debt to Jeremy Bentham’s Panopticon. Devizes Prison (properly Devizes County House of Corrections or colloquially “New Bridewell”) was designed by Richard Ingleman (1777-1838). Construction was completed in 1817, and the facility remained in use until being closed and demolished in […]
![[Probably after Clarence Larkin], THE DISPENSATIONS. No place, no date, but American, 20th century.](https://bostonraremaps.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/BRM3962-The-Dispensations_lowres-scaled-e1628030280847-150x150.jpg)
A mammoth and striking dispensationalist banner, mapping the spiritual development of humanity as purportedly predicted in the Old and New Testaments. Unsigned and unattributed, but the design strongly reminiscent of the work of Dispensationalist minister Clarence Larkin, and with a crude power that renders it a remarkable piece of American folk art. Clarence Larkin and […]