Mappe-Monde Geo Spherique ou Nouvelle Carte Ideale Du Globe Terrestre Pour servir d'Introduction a la Geographie, L'Hydrographie, et a la Sphere Armillaire . . . 1760 Hand color engraving on paper Dimensions: paper H213/8" x W31" Condition: lost and tear to the paper. Note: Scarce double-hemisphere map of the world designed by the geographer Louis Claude De Vezou. The map is topped with the inscription "artibus est instar solis" (The arts are like the sun). The map shows only land outlines and major rivers, but is covered with extensive scientific information engraved across the face of the map and in the borders around the hemispheres. Australia is joined to both Tasmania and Papua, New Guinea. The mapping of the Northwest Coast of America is quite conservative, with no hint of the Bay of the West or any of the other fantastic mythical projections popularized by the Russian, French and English mapmakers of the period. Around the outside of the map are diagrams of such theories as the movements of the planets, according to Ptolemy, Copernicus, Tycho Brahe and Descartes. Around the title is an elaborately engraved cartouche featuring a portrait in profile of Louis XV and a vignette of cherubs studying a globe. A fantastic marriage of 18th Century map making and popular astronomical science.

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