L'Histoire du Nouveau Monde ou Description des Indes Occidentales, Contenant dix-huict Liures, Par le Sieur Iean de Laet, d'Anuers; Enrichi de nouuelles Tables Geographiques & Figures des Animaux, Plantes & Fruicts
Leiden: Bonaventure and Abraham Elzevir, 1640. First edition in French.
Folio in 4s (13” x 8 7/16”, 330mm x 213mm): π2 **-****4 A-Kkkk4 Llll6 [$3 signed]. 336 leaves, pp. [28] (title, blank, verse, list of maps, 8pp. preface, 15pp. contents, list of in-text illustrations), 1-632, [12] (12pp. index). With 14 double-page engraved maps and many woodcuts integral to the text.
Bound in contemporary mottled sheep (re-backed, with the original back-strip laid down). On the spine, six raised bands. Author and title gilt to the second panel. All edges of the text-block speckled red.
Re-backed, with the original back-strip laid down. Corners strengthened and the end-papers renewed. Raised bands rubbed. Filled loss to the upper edge as well as to a transverse split of the title-leaf. Worming to the fore-margin of Xxx2-3 (pp. 531-534). Damp-stain to the fore-margin of Gggg1 (p. 501) through the rear paste-down. Repaired tear to the first leaf of the map of Florida. Ownership signature of “Fr. Eiman” (?) on the title page.
De Laet first published his account of the New World as Nieuwe Wereldt ofte Beschrijvinghe van West-Indien… (Leiden, 1625). This French edition, probably translated by de Laet himself — each edition, from the 1633 Latin to this French, became more complete and accurate, making the French edition the most desirable (see Sabin) — is one of the most important seventeenth-century New World histories and texts concerning early knowledge of the Americas. The “Nova Anglia” map, showing the coast and inland areas from Nova Scotia to North Carolina, is the first printed map to mention the name Manhattan, here spelled “Manbattes.”
The Streeter catalogue notes that “it is also the earliest to use the Dutch names of Noordt Rivier and Zuyd Rivier, for the Hudson and Delaware Rivers respectively, as well as the Indian Massachusets, for the new English colony ... [the ‘Nova Francia’ map] is one of the foundation maps of Canada” (Streeter). It is “one of the most famous contemporary descriptions of the natural history of the New World. The work was highly praised a century later by Charlevoix, attesting to its accuracy [...] Winsor referred to Laet’s book as the standard seventeenth-century work on New Netherland” (ibid.). The fourteen double-page maps are the work of Hessel Gerritsz, a Dutch engraver who was appointed official cartographer of both Dutch India Companies (over Blaeu).
Of the signature on the title-page nothing can be gleaned; the CERL thesaurus records no “Eiman” and variations of the name are difficult to construct. The volume was later in the collection of Francis Anthony Benevento II (his sale, Sotheby’s London 6 May 2010, lot 41). Frank Benevento (1947–2023) was a lawyer and later an investment banker with Lehman Brothers who began his collection of great maps and atlases here at Arader Galleries. Our purchasing dominated his sale.
Alden & Landis 640/111; Borba de Moraes I.384; cf. Burden 229-232; Cumming, Southeast 34; Phillips 1149; Sabin 38558; Streeter sale 37; Willems 382.
Item #SJF0010
Price: $36,000