Code: 53353
Author: Speed, John
Date published: 1611
First edition. English text on verso. Copper engraving with later hand colouring. English text on verso. Overall sheet size: 54.3cms x 41.4cms; image size: 508mm x 385mm. Overall browning front and back ; re-margined left and right margins with old strengthening 4cms square on verso right.Line of old mount burn top and bottom margin from previous framing. Inset of Harlech Castle with highly decorative scale of mile and compass. Speed found Merionethshire to be bereft of 'stately buildings'. Speed notes that the faces of the mountains, once famous for their wolves are now covered 'with fruitfull flocks of sheep, besides neate and other cattell' also that there is an 'abundance of Herrings ' caught and that people come from far and wide for them. Unfortunately, there are no surviving records of how many examples of the First Edition (or indeed of any edition) were printed. One might speculate that the First Edition could have numbered between about five hundred and one thousand examples. It should be remembered that market for maps was not well developed in England in 1612. This, together with the cost of the atlas, the need for a second edition soon afterwards, and the high quality of impressions from the third, Latin text, edition of 1616, suggests that the first print-run may have been closer to five hundred copies or so. Unfortunately, until an attempt is made at a census of surviving examples, these figures can be regarded as only the roughest of estimates. Ashley Baynton-Williams see http://www.mapforum.com/02/speed.htm