Auction Binoche et Giquello 23 October, 2020
BINOCHE & GIQUELLO
Auction : Friday 23 October, 2020
Drouot-Richelieu, 9, rue Drouot 75009
Lot 204
CHAMBON, Gobert-Denis. Mappemonde contenant les parties connues du globe terrestre dressée suivant de nouvelles observations. Paris, Longchamps et Janvier, 1754. Wall map printed on two sheets and surrounded by borders with biblical vignettes in six sheets, laid down on linen, and mounted at the time on two wooden poles. Paper browned, with crease marks and tears but without loss of paper. Sold as is. 1140 x 1450 mm.
Sold for 6 100 €
First state of this wall map of the world published in Paris, depicting the Eastern and Western hemispheres supported by two male figures, decorated at the bottom right and left with two celestial hemispheres (boreal and southern) and at the bottom in the middle with an armillary sphere, in addition, surrounded by decorative borders made up of vignettes depicting scenes from Genesis.
This map is most notable for its depiction of the Sea of Japan labeled "Mer de Corée" and of "Mer de L'Ouest" or Sea of the West - a great sea, easily the size of the Mediterranean, to flow from the then-known Strait of Juan de Fuca.
Australia and New Zealand are depicted in typical post-Tasman form, however, unlike other French cartographers at the time who tended to join New Guinea to Tasmania in a single and highly creative, imaginary coastline, Janvier leaves those undiscovered coastlines blank.
Early Dutch discoveries are noted in Australia and New Zealand, as are other recent discoveries around the world. The tracks of Magellan, Vasco da Gama and Francis Drake are shown.
This map shows an early copy of a Buache type 1 Mer de l'Ouest.
Three states of this map were found. There may be more.
- State 1: Dated 1754. Under the title, engraved by "Chambon". Lower left, "A PARIS, chés les Sieurs Longchamps et Janvier, Geographes, rue St Jacques a l'Enseigne de la Place des Victoires."
- State 2: Dated 1788. Now "chez Mondhare and Jean".
- State 3: Dated An 8 (1799-1800). Now "Paris Chez Jean rue Jean de Beauvois, No. 32".
McGuirk, The Last Great Cartographic Myth - Mer de l'Ouest, 30
Lot 206
CLOUET, J-B. L. (Abbé) / MONDHARE, L. Carte d'Amérique, divisée en ses principaux pays, dressée sur les mémoires les plus récents et sur différents Voyages, et assujettie aux observations Astronomiques…
Paris et Cadix, Mondhare, 1776
Sold for 3000 euros
Wall map printed from four plates, dissected in 40 pieces and backed on linen. Overall slightly browned, a few water staining and brown spotting. Linen worn along folds. Copper engraved map on paper, in later colours. 960 x 1240mm. Rare and decorative wall map of America. The map is surrounded by vignettes depicting crucial historical incidents or episodes of discovery and exploration: Découverte de l'Amérique, Conquête de l'Empire du Mexique, Découverte du Détroit de Magellan… With two title-cartouches, as well as captions in French and Spanish. It is possible the map was intended for the Spanish market. Depicting all the major early explorer's trails. With an inset map that indicates a Northwest Passage based on the supposed voyage of the apocryphal Admiral de Fonte. The map figures also the fictitious "Mer de L'Ouest". The publisher Mondhare has retained the mythical depiction of the Sea of the West in North America and offers a number of tantalizing options for a northwest passage, while also including a massive nascent depiction of Alaska and the Aleutian Archipelago, which was then at the end of a 40 year period of debate between the theories of the Paris based De L’Isle family of mapmakers, the English cartographer Thomas Jefferys and the Russian Academy.
Reference: Don McGuirk, The Last Great Cartographic Myth: Mer de l’Ouest, 56.
Béatrice Loeb is for more than 30 years an expert for maps and atlases to be sold at auctions held by leading auction houses as Binoche & Giquello, PIASA, Ader Nordmann, Daguerre, Rossini, Nouvelle Etude, Kahn-Dumousset, Libert at Drouot.
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