This was originally issued like so many works in the eighteenth century in parts, the first appearing on 8 April 1769. The four-page prospectus surviving in the Bodleian Library outlines the project. The competed work is this two volume topographical production describing England and Wales with short chapters on Scotland and the Channel Islands at the end. They are arranged approximately in the same order as William Camden’s ‘Britannia’. The work is extra illustrated with a series of approximately eighty copper plate views.

The cartographic content of the ‘England Displayed’ is mixed. The first several parts from Cornwall to Dorset utilised maps by Thomas Kitchin first published in the ‘London Magazine’. At about this time the arrangement changed and the plates owned by Mary Ann Rocque were presumably bought in. Towards the end of the publication however, those of Kitchin and George Rollos were used. This may reflect upon Mary Ann Rocque, as the plates do not appear in the sale of her goods in the auction catalogue of 4 July 1771. This example bears thirty-seven maps from Rocque, some examples include the Rocque version of Wiltshire whereas this contains that of Kitchin. Ten maps are from the Kitchin series which are Cornwall, Devon, Somerset, Dorset, Wiltshire, Oxfordshire, Cheshire, Yorkshire, Caernarvonshire and Cardiganshire. The remaining seven maps are made up of a folding map of Great Britain, a folding map of twenty miles round London, four county maps by Rollos originally published in the ‘British Magazine’, 1762-63 and a map of Bedfordshire derived from that of Rollos. The final map of the Channel Islands is not called for and not always present as here. Provenance: stamp of ‘R*L’ to titles; Alex Jackson collection; Clive A. Burden Ltd. 1996; private collection. Chubb (1927) 210 & 236; ESTC T110454; Hodson (1984-97) 203 & App I no. 4 (Rollos); Worms & Baynton-Williams (2011).