Greece - Greece; John Speed - Greece - 1661-1680

GREECE.

Highly decorative 17th Century copper engraved map of Greece produced by the famous English mapmaker, John Speed. The present map is an excellent example of Speed's work, from his 'Prospect Of The Most Famous Parts Of The World.' The map centres on the Greece and the Aegean Sea. This edition was published by Bassett & Chiswell in 1676.

Measures 380 x 500 mm. See photos for condition. Good condition.

Attractive hand colour.

JOHN SPEED

John Speed (1551 or 1552 – 28 July 1629) was an English cartographer , chronologer and historian
of Cheshire origins. The son of a citizen and Merchant Taylor in London, he rose from his family
occupation to accept the task of drawing together and revising the histories, topographies and maps
of the Kingdoms of Great Britain as an exposition of the union of their monarchies in the person
of King James I and VI. He accomplished this with remarkable success, with the support and
assistance of the leading antiquarian scholars of his generation. He drew upon and improved the
shire maps of Christopher Saxton , John Norden and others, being the first to incorporate
the hundred-boundaries into them, and he was the surveyor and originator of many of the town or
city plans inset within them. His work helped to define early modern concepts of British national
identity. His Biblical genealogies were also formally associated with the first edition of the King
James Bible . He is among the most famous of English mapmakers.
Speed is now best-known as a map-maker, and above all for his atlas, The Theatre of the Empire of
Great Britaine (1611, 1616, 1623), which attempted a complete set of individual county maps
of England and Wales , as well as maps of Ireland and a general map of Scotland . A 21-year royal
privilege (franchise) for the printing of Speed's Theatre was granted to George Humble in April
1608. The collection developed cumulatively, together with his History, and was undertaken with
the encouragement of William Camden . The entire work, including the History, was dedicated to
King James I as the ruler in whom the distinct Kingdoms of the British Isles had been brought
together under one rule in such a way as to form an Empire.
In 1627, two years before his death, was published Speed's A Prospect of the Most Famous Parts of
the World, printed by John Dawson for George Humble. This was the first world atlas produced by
an Englishman. With it were also included the County and Kingdom maps from the Theatre,
corresponding to the third edition of that work, together with a New and Accurat Map of the
World in a double hemisphere projection.