“This desirable map is the first published in an atlas to depict California as an island, and an accurate east coast of North America, particularly between Chesapeake Bay and Cape Cod.” (Burden). It was first published in the 1627 edition of John Speed’s ‘Theatre of the Empire of Great Britain’, the first English world atlas. For this edition the work was expanded with ‘A Prospect of the Most Famous Parts of the World’ which included a further twenty maps

The map is engraved by the Dutchman Abraham Goos (c.1590-1643) who drew on his engraving of North America from 1624, and the Henry Briggs map of 1625, to depict California as an island once more. “He was the only Dutch cartographer to do so for some considerable time. There are five fewer placenames in California than the Briggs. However, like his earlier one he includes a similar faint north-west coastline and Strait of Anian. ‘Brasil’ and ‘Frisland’, remnants from the sixteenth century, make a stubborn appearance in the North Atlantic. The fledgling colonies of ‘Plymouth’ in New England, and ‘Iames Citti’ in Virginia, are both recognised. Decorating the whole are three attractive borders. The two sides illustrate the natives of the continent, the left bears those of the north, and the right those of the south. Despite the map’s obvious attention to the English presence in North America, none of the eight towns represented in the third are from that part. This is owing to the relative lack of any contemporary views to draw upon.” (Burden).

South America includes ‘Bones Aeyres’ founded in 1580. It is also one of the earliest maps to record Tierra del Fuego following Jacob Le Maire and Cornelis Schouten’s voyage rounding Cape Horn 1615-17. John Speed (1552-1629) was a historian, but his most remembered for his maps. He was, like his father, a tailor by trade. The 1627 edition was published by George Humble, who reissued it in 1631. Provenance: Juan and Peggy Rada Collection. Burden (1996) 217; Leighly (1972) pl. 4; McLaughlin & Mayo (1995) no. 3; Skelton (1970) no. 16; Tooley (1964) p. 113; Tooley (1973) pp. 302-3; Tooley (1977) pp. 4-9; Wheat (1957) pp. 36-7 & no. 39.