BLAEU, Willem (1571-1638). Insulæ Americanæ in Oceano Septentrionali, cum terris adiacentibus. Amsterdam: Blaeu, 1640. Engraved with period outline colour. Image size: 15 x 20 3/4 inches. Sheet size: 18 x 23 3/8 inches. French text. Mild soiling more evident at the edges. Repaired split at base of center fold.

This attractive map called the American Islands is essentially a coastal chart of the eastern seaboard from the Chesapeake to Florida, all of the Gulf of Mexico to the Orinoco River in Venezuela, and part of the Pacific coast of Central America.

The map was based upon the Hessel Gerritz map of circa 1631, which was separately published and is extremely rare. Gerritz was the cartographer for the Dutch West India Company, working under Johannes de Laet, who was in charge of Dutch interests in the Americas and Africa. The new material for this map was gathered in 1628 during a voyage through the region that may have included Chesapeake Bay and certainly included all the places from the Bahamas south and southwest depicted in the map.

Koeman, Bl 17, #81; Goss, Blaeu's The Grand Atlas of the 17th Century, p. 124-125; Burden, The Mapping of North America 242 and 236.