This fine map is considered the most decorative ever published of the county of Oxfordshire. What makes it particularly striking are the 172 coats of arms surrounding the map. Those along the top border represent the eighteen University Colleges, the City of Oxford along with the University and four further towns within the county. The remainder belong to the gentry in the county. A few roads are shown which makes the map notable for being one of the earliest English county maps to depict any. It is engraved by Michael Burghers (1647?-1727), who is noted for engraving the plates for David Loggan’s ‘Oxonia Illustrata’ published two years earlier. The map illustrates Robert Plot’s ‘The Natural History of Oxford-Shire’ a work noted for being one of the first to depict fossils. Plot was a Professor of Chemistry at the University and later would become the first Keeper of the Ashmolean Museum. Provenance: Jonathan Potter 2008; private collection of Rodney Shirley. Worms & Baynton-Williams (2011).