CHINA - ORTELIUS, Abraham (1527-98). Chinae, olim Soinarum regionis, nova descripitio, auctore Ludovico Georgio. [Antwerp: 1608].

Double-page engraved map (plate: 370 x 470; sheet: 489 x 590mm), Italian text on verso, contemporary hand colour, title cartouche surmounted by two putti at lower left, privilege and scale bar set in two decorative cartouches (some marginal staining, lightly browned, upper corner torn with loss of a few words on verso, a few discreet repairs).

On its first publication in his Theatrum Orbis Terrarum, Ortelius's map of China was the first to appear in a European atlas and '... remained the standard type for the interior of China for over sixty years' (Tooley). It was based on a manuscript map made by the Portuguese Jesuit, Ludovicus Georgius. See Tooley, Maps and Map-Makers, p.106, and M.P.R. van den Broecke, Ortelius Atlas Maps, 164.

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