A REMARKABLE COLLECTION OF ONE OF THE RAREST OF ALL ENGLISH COUNTY ATLASES which survives in just four known examples. There are only two copies of the first edition of 1816 known, one in the Allen Collection at the Bodleian Library (lacking Hertfordshire) and one in a private English collection. There are two examples of another issue with ten maps bearing later dates. Robert Rowe (c.1775-1843) was a publisher and engraver but it is as the latter that he is most noted. It is possible that he both drew and engraved the maps in ‘The English Atlas’. Amongst his earliest works is the engraving of two sets of playing cards of the English Counties. Both are similarly exceedingly rare; those of John Fairburn, 1798, and those of Joseph Allen, 1811.

The dates on the individual maps vary somewhat in the first edition of 1816. The earliest found is on that of Yorkshire dated 1810, in three of the surviving examples this map is found on thicker paper. It is therefore logical to assume that it was not until 1811 at the earliest that he conceived of producing an atlas, seven maps are so dated. This may have followed on from the success of the Allen cards in the same year. Maps of individual counties are known to have been sold separately and found folding in to a slipcase. 1812 was a lean year with only 3 produced but then he started in earnest producing 15 in 1813 and 10 in 1814. Finances may have been stretched by then as 1815 only produced 5 with the final 2 being dated 1 January 1816. The second edition contains an unaltered title page and 10 maps with revised dates. It is known that some of the more researched county maps bore new detail and it is possible more maps were altered. Examining the dates of the altered maps does not reveal much. Hampshire was re-dated 1818 and Devon, Dorset, Middlesex and Suffolk 1819. Five further south east counties were re-dated 1821. This series of maps by Rowe is better known through its later history. Henry Teesdale (fl.1828-43) set up in business in 1828 and the following year acquired the plates of Rowe’s atlas. After alteration they were included in the ‘New British Atlas’ first published in 1829. Teesdale was a founder fellow of the Royal Geographical Society. Later lithographic uses were made by Henry George Collins from 1852 and George Philip shortly after.

The intervening years between 1821 and their acquisition by Teesdale was until now an unknown period. This PREVIOUSLY UNRECORDED SERIES OF FOLDING MAPS reveals even later dates. Four of the maps present bear differences from the last known issue. Berkshire and Dorset curiously bear earlier dates from the first edition but Warwickshire is dated 1824 and that of South Wales is dated 1825. Loose examples of Lincolnshire and Sussex, both dating from the early period are recorded. So this discovery of no less than forty more is a great find. Beresiner (1983) p. 190; refer Burden (1994) 73; refer Carroll (1996) 71.1; refer (1927) Chubb 354A; Worms & Baynton-Williams (2011).