The works that shaped the European understanding of the world: travel accounts, maps, atlases, globes and instruments from the great age of exploration, together with the books of science, navigation and astronomy that made those discoveries possible.
We specialise in the voyages of discovery that laid the foundation of Dutch and Western European prosperity, from the late fifteenth century into the eighteenth. From the great Spanish, Portuguese and English expeditions, through the pivotal knowledge made available by Jan Huygen van Linschoten, the key to the East and the birth of the VOC, to the voyages of Barentsz, Van Noort and De Houtman. The travel accounts, maps, atlases, globes, letters and instruments created in their wake form the focus of our collection, together with the books of science that made those voyages possible: navigation, astronomy, cosmography, mathematics and natural history.
Theodor de Bry (1528–1598) and sons Johann Theodor & Johann Israel de Bry, 1590–1634
Abraham Ortelius (1527–1598), 1641
Hartmann Schedel (1440–1514), 12 July 1493
Reinier and Josua Ottens, with maps by Visscher, De Wit, Delisle, Jaillot, Covens & Mortier, Schenk, Valk and others, No date, but 1730 or shortly after
Giovanni Battista Ramusio, 1563; 1583; 1565
Sebastian Franck (with Ulrich Schmidel and Hans von Staden), 1567
A curated, working stock of books, maps and atlases, with a dedicated "hospital" preparing exceptional works for the market.
The reference library — the books about the books — underpinning rigorous, best-in-class scholarship and description.
A trusted name and a network of collectors, museums and institutions, built on knowledge, discretion and connoisseurship.
The seventh and last volume of Henri Abraham Chatelain's Atlas Historique has joined the collection: the Suplément à l'Atlas historique, Tome VII & dernier,…
Read moreTwo large folios have joined the collection, both concerned with the way seventeenth and eighteenth-century Europe tried to put the whole world into a single…
Read moreWe are pleased to announce the acquisition of a complete copy of Arnoldus Montanus, De Nieuwe en Onbekende Weereld: of Beschryving van America en 't…
Read moreWe are pleased to announce the acquisition of a complete copy of Johan Nieuhof's L'Ambassade de la Compagnie Orientale des Provinces Unies vers l'Empereur de…
Read moreWe have added to our stock the fifth volume of Henri Abraham Chatelain's Atlas historique, the volume devoted to Asia, in its first edition, printed at…
Read moreWe have added to the collection Joan Blaeu's Iaponia Regnum, the map of Japan and Korea from the Novus Atlas Sinensis, the atlas of China that the Jesuit…
Read moreWe are not a shop. We present works in person — with the history, the context and the object in hand — to collectors and institutions who share our fascination with the age of discovery. Enquiries and viewings are warmly welcomed.