1849 Plate / Chesney Map of Arabia and the Persian Gulf

Most comprehensive and detailed mid-19th century map of Arabia.

This is William Henry F. Plate's important 1849 map of Arabia, the Persian Gulf, Syria, and Mesopotamia. The product of a wave of new exploration and surveys in the first half of the 19th century, this map is the most significant and detailed map of Arabia and the Persian Gulf to appear in the mid-19th century.

A Closer Look

Coverage encompasses the Arabian Peninsula, bounded by the Red Sea to the west, the Persian Gulf to the east, and the Indian Ocean to the south. Coverage extends north as far as the Caspian Sea and the Gulf of Iskenderun. The map further extends west to the Nile Valley, and includes in its coverage the Levant (Palestine, Lebanon, Jordan, Syria) and the valleys of the Tigris and Euphrates (Iraq). It is among the earliest maps to name Bahrain (Bahreïn, labeling both the island and the Qatar Peninsula) and the Trucial Coast emirates, including Abu Dhabi (Abbothubbee) and Dubai (Debai). In Arabia, numerous other towns and cities are named, some speculatively, including Riyadh (Riad), Mecca (Mekkah), and Medina. Chesney's route through Mesopotamia is traced in blue.

Most significantly, the map attempts with some success to map the interior topography, villages, wells, pilgrimage and caravan routes (some of which are notably seasonal), mines, and more. Much of the cartography here is speculative, or at least interpretive. Still, the whole is successful, making this the most comprehensive and detailed map of the 19th century, surpassing by far the earlier contender, Heinrich Berghaus's 1835 Arabia und das Nil-Land.

Sources

Although attributed to Francis Rawdon Chesney in the title, less than 5% of the map can be associated with him, the bulk of the map is from a variety of other sources. Here is a general breakdown:

• Tigris and Euphrates Valleys - From original surveys and material collected by Francis Rawdon Chesney's Euphrates Expedition
• Persian Gulf - Drawn from earlier Bombay Marine Surveys by George Barnes Brucks, G. M. Guy, Robert Cogan, S. B. Haines, and W. E. Rogers, conducted in the 1820s and not published until 1832, of which a single example survives in the British Library.
• Arabia - The coastlines of Arabia are based upon the above Bombay Marine surveys; the interior is based on a variety of sources, primarily those collected by the Austrian medical doctor and Islamicist Aloys Sprenger (1813 - 1893). The plate also extensively references the journals of the Swiss explorer Johann Ludwig Burckhardt (1784 - 1817), who, under the name Sheik Ibrahim Ibn Abdallah, 'discovered' the magnificent ruins of Petra at Wadi Musa in 1812, and completed the pilgrimage to Mecca and Medinah in 1814, becoming the first European to do so.

Publication History and Census

This map was initially drawn by William Henry F. Plate in 1847; only a single example of this edition survives (British Library, IOR/X/3205). This second edition, issued in 1849, was updated with new information collected by Francis Rawdon Chesney, particularly in Mesopotamia, during his Euphrates Expedition. It was engraved by J. and C. Walker and published by Longman, Brown and Company for issue in Chesney's The Expedition For The Survey Of The Rivers Euphrates And Tigris. Rare. OCLC identifies just 5 examples, located at Harvard, Qatar National Library, the British Library, the National Library of Scotland, and the University of Glasgow.

Cartographers

William Henry Francis Plate (Wilhelm Heinrich Franz Plate; March 12, 1810 - August 26, 1853) was a German-British lawyer, geographer, and orientalist active in the mid-19th century. Plate was born in Emden, Lower Saxony, Germany to Henry Francis Frederic Plate, the Governor of Delmanhorst. He studied law, achieving a doctorate, and practice for a short time in Holstein. It is not clear when he emigrated to England, but he was in London from at least 1830, and from that point forward, dedicated himself fully to oriental studies, forgoing the law. At some point, he anglicized his name, Wilhelm Heinrich Franz Plate, and settled in Islington, London. He was a regular at the British Museum. He was admitted to the Société de Géographie in Paris in 1842, where he proposed a second river joining the Sea of Azov to the Black Sea. He was the Head Geographer of the Wernerian Club, Honorary Secretary of the Syro-Egyptian Society of London, member of the Geographical Society of Parus, and a corresponding member of the Deutsche Morgenländische Gesellschaft. Plate was a regular contributor to the London German Gazette and is listed as author for the lengthy entry on ‘Arabia’ in the SDUK Supplement to the Penny Cyclopaedia. At some point, Plate became associated with William Grimstone, who successfully cultivated a pea seed extracted from a 3000-year-old Egyptian vase. Plate apparently sent several 'mummy pea' seeds to Germany where his father cultivated them with great success. Despite an impressive academic career, Plate is perhaps best known as the person who officially recommended Karl Marx for admission to the British Museum Reading Room. Plate's wife suddenly died in 1851, perhaps leading to a spiral of depression, for on August 26, 1853, he tragically committed suicide using prussic acid (oil of bitter almonds).   Further Details...

Francis Rawdon Chesney (March 16, 1789 - January 30, 1872) was a British general and explorer. Chesnew was born in Annalong, County Down, Ireland. His father, Alexander Chesney, served Francis Rawdon-Hastings (Lord Rawdon; 1754 - 1826) during the American Revolutionary War (1775 - 1783). Rawdon sponsored the younger Chesney for a cadetship at the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich, and in 1805, he was gazetted to the Royal Artillery. Chesney was stationed in the Middle East, where he rose to prominence, leading an inspection tour of Egypt and Syria. In 1830, he submitted a report on the feasibility of a Suez Canal - it was this report that proved the basis of Ferdinand Marie de Lesseps (1805 - 1894) plans for the Canal. Chesney was confident that the Euphrates was navigable by steamships and would provide an expeditious route to India that did not require rounding Africa. He persuaded Parliament to fund an expedition to this effect, which launched in 1835. Although suffering numerous setbacks, the Expedition was ultimately successful, reaching the Persian Gulf in June 1836, proving that the Euphrates was indeed steam-navigable. Back in England, he was awarded the Royal Geographical Society's Founder's Medal, promoted to Major, and received a commission to compose a detailed account of the Expedition, which was published in 1850 as The Expedition for the Survey of the Rivers Euphrates and Tigris. He served abroad once in 1843 in Hong Kong after the First Opium War (1839 - 1842), after which, in 1847, his period of service complete, he retired to Ireland. He twice returned to the Middle East to work on railway surveys, in 1856 and 1862, but the railway was never built. He died in Ireland in 1872.   Further Details...

John Walker (1787 - April 19, 1873) was a British map seller, engraver, lithographer, hydrographer, geographer, draughtsman, and publisher active in London during the 19th century. Walker published both nautical charts and geographical maps. His nautical work is particularly distinguished as he was an official hydrographer for the British East India Company, a position, incidentally, also held by his father of the same name. Walker's maps, mostly published after 1827, were primarily produced with his brothers Charles Walker and Alexander Walker under the imprint J. and C. Walker. Among their joint projects are more than 200 maps for the influential Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge Atlas (SDUK). In addition they published numerous charts for James Horsburgh and the British Admiralty Hydrographic Office, including Belcher's important map of Hong Kong and Carless' exploratory map of Karachi. The J. and C. Walker firm continued to publish after both Walkers died in the 1870s.   Further Details...

Longman (fl. c. 1720 - present) is a long-lived and venerable British publishing firm initially founded in the 1720s by Thomas Longman (1699 - 1755). Longman was born in Bristol and in 1716 was apprenticed to John Osborn, a London printer and bookseller. Completing his apprenticeship, Longman requested and was granted Osborn's daughter's hand in marriage. Shortly afterward, Longman acquired the stock of Robinson Crusoe publisher William Taylor and, along with Osborn, established a printing office on Paternoster Row. The two published numerous works, including Samuel Johnson's Dictionary. Around the same time that Osborn retired, Thomas Longman's nephew, another Thomas Longman (1730 - 1797), joined the firm, which was subsequently renamed T. and T. Longman. On the death of the original Thomas Longman, the nephew took over the firm and eventually passed it on to his son, Thomas Norton Longman (1771 - 1842). Thomas Norton seemed to have had a passion for partnering and, over the years, added Owen Rees (1730 - 1797), Thomas Brown (c. 1777 - 1869), and three more mysterious partners, Hurst, Orme, and Green, to the corporation's partner list. For many years, the firm published as Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, Brown & Green. Thomas Norton eventually passed the firm to his own sons, Thomas and William, who, during their tenure, bought out most of the minor partners, renaming the firm Longmans, Green & Co. Later, Thomas Longman's son took full control of the firm, renaming it Longman. During World War II, most of their plates and stock were destroyed, but the company nonetheless survived and went public in 1948. Longman was eventually acquired by the media conglomerate Pearson and continues to publish as Pearson Longman.   Further Details...

Source

Chesney, F. R., Expedition for the Survey of the Rivers Euphrates and Tigris, (London: Longman, Brown, Green and Longmans) 1850.    

Condition

Very good. Some wear and verso reinforcement on old fold lines. Right margin extended in places.

References

OCLC 556388606.