Doncker Sea Atlas

DONCKER, Hendrik (1626-1699).
De Zee-Atlas ofte Water-Waereld, vertoonende alle de Zee-Kusten van het bekende deel des Aerd-Bodems.
Amsterdam: Henrick Doncker, [1658-1665].

Folio (18 x 12 inches). 12 pages of text number 12-24 listing 30 maps (edges with early repairs). Engraved allegorical title-page border (without letterpress), double-page double-hemisphere world map by de Wit dated 1660 with elaborate border with celestial spheres, polar spheres, vignettes representing the elements and elaborate floral bouquets, and 33 double-page engraved maps, all with contemporary hand-colour in outline and all mounted on guards (all but one laid down on heavier stock, some early marginal repairs). Contemporary natural deerskin over modern paste-board (endpapers and mounts renewed).

Most of the maps in this atlas are dated 1664, although the earliest is 1658 and the latest 1665. Those relating to America include "Caribische." (no date), the West Indies (1658), "Brazil en Nieu Nederlandt" (no date), "Nieu Nederland" (1660), "Brasilia" (no date), "America" (no date), and "Chili, Peru, Hispania Nova, Nova Granada en California" (no date). Also including Doncker's map of the Indian Ocean "Mar de India", first issued by Janssonius in 1650, and reissued by Doncker as here in 1659. "On this map . the Australian continent bears the name 'Terra del Zur' (South Land), though soon most Dutch maps would bear the name 'Hollandia Nova' (New Holland). It is remarkable, however, given Doncker's reputation for keeping his maps up-to-date, that the discoveries of Tasman betwenn 1642 and 1644 are not shown" (Martin Woods for "Mapping our World: Terra Incognita to Australia", National Library of Australia, page 145).

First published in 1659 with 19 charts and published throughout the next decade culminating in an edition with 50 maps in 1669, "Doncker's charts were the most up-to-date in the second half of the 17th-century" (Koeman). A bookseller in Amsterdam from the age of 22, Doncker ran an extremely successful business for more than fifty years: a publisher of the "most popular sets of maritime works published in Amsterdam during the Golden Age" (Koeman), including pilot guides, sea atlases, and textbooks on the art of navigation.

Doncker was the first cartographer to publish a sea atlas after Arnold Colom's publications in 1654 and 1658. Although his Sea-Atlas is similar to the publications of Van Loon, Goos, and Lootsman, Doncker's charts were original, frequently corrected and improved. After Hendrik's death in 1699, his son Hendrik, jr continued to publish important sea-atlases. Koeman IV, Don 8b.

Comparable: Swann, 2015 - $125,000; Sotheby's, 2005 - 86,400 GBP.