With fine hand-coloring throughout

HOMANN, Johann Baptist.

Homannischer Atlas von Hundert Landkarten darinne die Erdkugel mit allen ihren Theilen geographisch vorgestellet und nach dem Unterschied der Reiche und Staaten deutlich illuminiret worden. Nebst einer Einleitung in die mathematische, natürliche und historische Geographie.

Nürnberg: In Verlag der Homannischen Erben, 1747.

1st Edition. Hardcover. Very Good. Item #003817

Large Folio (533 x 335 mm). [2], 40 pp. of text; engraved additional title, engraved portrait frontispiece of Homann, letterpress title printed in red and black with engraved vignette, index of maps, 40 pages of text in German and 100 engraved maps (2 folding) with designations in Latin, French or German, all with fine contemporary hand-coloring. Each map bound-in double-page on stubs. The engraved additional title titled in Latin "Atlas Novus Terrarum Orbis Imperia, Regna et Status exactis Tabulis Geographice demonstrans, Opera". Bound in its original, contemporary full calf, spine with 8 raised bands, gilt tooled in compartments, gilt lettering pieces in second and eights compartment; boards mottled and with gilt tooling, red-dyed edges (repairs to binding, spine, joints and corners, boards and edges rubbed and scratched). The text and plates generally clean and bright, some marginal restorations with Japan paper of tears and edge defects, light even browning, minor occasional spotting, staining and soiling mostly at outer margins. Map 25/Lothringia with repaired torn patch at right fore-margin with loss of border; map 26/Romano-Germanici shorter at upper margin, map 53/Italia slightly shaved at upper margin ca. 1 mm into first headline, plate 59 with torn small patches near lower left corner affecting border. In all a very fine copy, rarely found in such condition with the original binding preserved. ----

FIRST EDITION in this form. Johann Baptist Homann (1664-1724) started his career in Amsterdam as a map engraver and apprentice with the Danckerts family before returning to Nuremberg to establish himself in business in 1702. Following the long Dutch tradition, the Homann family became the most prominent in the publication of maps in Germany in the 18th century, not only because they reintroduced the German language to the map business, but above all because Homann sold their maps at significantly lower prices than their Dutch and French counterparts, who had dominated the market until then. After the publication of his first atlas in 1707, Johann Baptist Homann became a member of the Berlin Academy of Sciences and in 1715 was appointed Geographer of the Emperor. After his death, the business was managed by his son until 1730 and subsequently passed on to his heirs with the name, precisely, of Homann Heirs.
The 103 hand-colored maps in our volume are by Johann Baptist Homann and his heirs as well as Matthäus Seutter and include a world map, 2 celestial, 4 maps of continents, and regional maps of Germany, France, Italy the Low Countries and others. The maps of the Americas include "Americae Mappa generalis" (1746), Homanns' second map of America, based on Jesuit explorations into the Interior of North America; and "Regni Mexicani seu Novae Hispaniae" (no date) with accurate depiction of the mouth of the Mississippi and the Great Lakes region. Added (and not part of this edition) are 3 maps of Tirol, Canada and Baleares islands. Our copy obviously lacks (never bound in) the privilege leaf, which is listed in the register of sheets. Except for this, the atlas is complete as called for.
Bibliography: Phillips 4195; and Wagner 1746 and 474. - Visit our website to see images of all maps!

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