1675 De Wit Nautical Map of the Pacific Ocean w/ California as an Island

California as an Island. One of the earliest obtainable sea charts of the Pacific.

This is a first-state example of Frederik de Wit's circa 1675 nautical chart of the Pacific Ocean in rich old color. Published in his Orbis Maritimus ofte Zee Atlas, it is among the earliest obtainable Dutch sea charts of the Pacific. It includes Insular California and incorporates Abel Tasman's discoveries in Australia and New Zealand. Discoveries of Dutch explorers are here reconciled with geographical information inherited from Spanish voyaging - including the theorized Spanish discovery of Hawaii - placing surveyed coastlines alongside conjectural lands and misplaced islands.

A Closer Look

The chart centers on the Pacific, extending from Japan, the Philippines, and the East Indies at the left to the island of California, Mexico, and Central America at the right. Northern Australia, Tasmania, and New Zealand occupy the southwestern quadrant. Coastal names receive close attention, while continental interiors remain largely empty: the emphasis is on maritime geography. A network of rhumb lines spreads across the ocean from multiple wind centers, supplemented by two colored compass roses. Latitude graduations flank the chart, and the equator and tropics provide reference lines across its considerable expanse.

Four ship scenes animate the otherwise open ocean, including vessels exchanging cannon fire. At lower right, the bilingual Latin and Dutch title appears within an elaborate maritime allegory: Neptune and his female consort, traditionally identified as Amphitrite, ride a chariot drawn by sea horses, surrounded by putti. Above them is a portrait typically identified as Ferdinand Magellan (c. 1480 - 1521), the first European navigator to cross the Pacific. His inclusion links the chart's contemporary geography to the ocean's earliest recorded European crossing.

California as an Island

California is important enough to De Wit's conception of the Pacific that it is included in the title. At upper right, a broad channel separates the elongated island from the American mainland. Its northern coast is deeply indented, while its southern extremity retains the recognizable outline of Baja California. The chart thus presents a supposed island comprising both the peninsula and a substantial portion of the coast farther north.

This geographical error entered printed European cartography by 1622, supposedly from erroneous Spanish reports, and became widely accepted by Dutch and English publishers. De Wit's chart records the misconception at the height of its currency, decades before Eusebio Francisco Kino's (1645 - 1711) explorations definitively established California's peninsularity. Even after those investigations, conducted between 1698 and 1701, insular California continued to appear on European maps well into the 18th century.

Tasman's Southwestern Pacific

The incomplete outlines of Hollandia Nova, Anthoni van Diemens Landt, and Zeelandia Nova preserve a different kind of uncertainty. Rather than supplying a conjectural eastern coast for Australia or completing New Zealand, De Wit leaves these lands open-ended. Tasmania appears as a separate fragment far south of Australia's known northern coast, without an established relationship to the continental mainland.

These outlines incorporate the voyages of Abel Janszoon Tasman (c. 1603 - 1659) in 1642 - 1643 and 1644. During the first voyage, Tasman encountered the southern coast of Tasmania and the western coasts of New Zealand before continuing through the southwestern Pacific. His second expedition examined the southern coast of New Guinea, the Gulf of Carpentaria, and northern and northwestern Australia. These voyages greatly enlarged European geographical knowledge without resolving the extent or connections of the lands encountered. De Wit's disconnected coastal fragments preserve those limits of observation.

Compagnies Land and the Search for Silver Islands

North of Japan, 't Land van Eso and Compagnies Lant introduce speculative geography derived from the 1643 Dutch East India Company expedition commanded by Maerten Gerritsz de Vries (1589 - 1647), whose journal was kept by Cornelis Jansz Coen. The expedition sought reputed gold and silver islands east of Japan. In exploring the southern Kurils, De Vries mistook Urup for a continental landmass and named it for the Company. De Wit's open-ended Compagnies Land preserves the enlargement of an observed island into a supposed mainland.

Spanish Discovery of Hawaii?

An intriguing feature is the scattering of North Pacific islands named Los Mouges (Los Monjes), La Vezina (La Vecina), La Desgraciada, and Ullao (Ulloa). This archipelago (if it can be called such), inherited from Spanish cartography, later became central to theories that Spanish navigators had reached Hawaii before Captain James Cook (1728 - 1779) arrived in 1778. The proposed discovery was commonly associated with Juan Gaetano (Juan Gaitán or Gaytán; fl. 1542 - 1555) and voyages attributed to him in 1542 or 1555.

Although these islands lie at approximately Hawaiian latitudes, their longitudes and arrangement do not match the archipelago - perhaps understandable given the difficulties of pre-chronometer cartographers in determining longitude at sea. Historical investigations, notably John F. G. Stokes's 1939 Hawaii's Discovery by Spaniards: Theories Traced and Refuted, challenged the documentary and cartographic arguments.

Publication History and Census

This undated chart is the first state, published in Amsterdam by Frederik de Wit (1629 - 1706) for his c. 1675 Orbis Maritimus ofte Zee Atlas. The engraving is unsigned, but can confidently be attributed to Romeyn de Hooghe (1645 - 1708), whose decorative work is associated with De Wit's maritime publishing. The present example is the first state, preceding the addition of I. de S. Andries off Baja California in the second state, generally dated circa 1680. Later impressions substituted the imprint of Louis Renard in 1715 and that of the Ottens firm in 1745. This is a full breakdown of known editions:

• 1675 circa: imprint of Frederick De Wit (present example)
• 1680 circa: I. de S. Andries off Baja
• 1715: imprint changed to L. Renard
• 1745: imprint changed to R and I Ottens

The plate thus remained relevant and in circulation for more than 70 years, with few substantive changes. We note De Wit examples cataloged circa 1675 at Stanford University and the University of Melbourne.

Cartographers

Frederik de Wit (1629 - July 1706) was a Dutch Golden Age cartographer active in the second half of the 17th and the early 18th centuries. De Wit was born to a middle-class Protestant family in the western Netherlandish town of Gouda. He relocated to Amsterdam sometime before 1648, where he worked under Willem Blaeu. His first attributed engraved map, a plan of Haarlem for Antonius Sanderus' Flandria Illustrata, was issued around this time. He struck out on his own in 1654, establishing the print and map shop De Witte Pascaert (The White Sea Chart) on the Kalverstraat. The first chart that De Wit personally both drew and engraved was most likely his 1659 map of Denmark, REGNI DANIÆ Accuratissima delineatio Perfeckte Kaerte van ‘t CONJNCKRYCK DENEMARCKEN. His great wall map of the world and most famous work, Nova Totius Terrarum Orbis Tabula appeared one year later. After publishing his wall map, De Wit quickly rose in prominence as both a cartographer and an engraver. He married Maria van der Way in 1661 and through her became a citizen of Amsterdam in 1662. Around this time, he also published his first major atlas, a composite production ranging from 17 to over 150 maps and charts. Other atlases and individual maps followed. In 1689, the Dutch States General granted De Wit a 15-year Privilege (An early copyright that protected the recipient's rights to print and publish), which can be helpful in the notoriously difficult task of dating De Wit maps. He received the honorific 'Good Citizen' in 1694. De Wit died in 1706, after which his wife Maria continued publishing his maps until about 1710. De Wit's son, Franciscus, had no interest in the map trade and instead prospered as a stockfish merchant. On her own retirement, Maria sold most De Wit maps and plates at a public auction. Most were acquired by Pieter Mortier and laid the groundwork for the 1721 rise of Covens and Mortier, the largest Dutch cartographic publishing house of the 18th century.   Further Details...

Romeyn de Hooghe (September 10, 1645 – June 10, 1708) was a Dutch engraver, portrait artist, caricaturist, painter, and sculptor active in Amsterdam during the second half of the 17th century and the opening years of the 18th century. De Hooghe was born in Amsterdam and revealed an early talent for all forms of visual arts. He became a known caricaturist and is admired today as one of the first great graphic satirists. During his life, he was criticized for his proclivity towards humorous tongue-in-cheek subjects. He nonetheless developed a following and produced a prolific amount of work, some 5000 engravings. He was a member of the Confrerie Pictura in 1662 and 1683. Cartographically, he is best known for his decorative border work. His disciples were Filibert Bouttats (1654-after 1731), Filibertus Bouttats (1635 - 1707), Frans Decker, François Harrewijn, Jacobus Harrewijn, Aernout Naghtegael, Laurens Scherm, and Adriaen Schoonebeek. De Hooghe died in Haarlem on June 10, 1708. Much of his work continued to be republished posthumously.   Further Details...

Source

de Wit, Frederick, Orbis Maritimus ofte Zee Atlas, (Amsterdam: Frederick de Wit) c. 1675.    

Condition

Excellent. Original color stablized on verso.

References

OCLC 1061230423. Rumsey 15889.030. McLaughlin, G., The Mapping of California as an Island: An Illustrated Checklist, #59. Tooley, R.V. (Amer) p.122, #40. Clancy, Robert, The Mapping of Terra Australis, (Sydney: Universal Press) #7.15. Suárez, Thomas, Early Mapping of the Pacific: The Epic Story of Seafarers, Adventurers, and Cartographers Who Mapped the Earth's Greatest Ocean, (Singapore: Periplus) 2004, fig.95. Carhart, G., Frederick De Wit and the First Concise Reference Atlas (Leiden-Boston: Brill-Hes and Degraaf), p. 473 C26.1. Van der Krogt, P. C. J., Koeman's Atlantes Neerlandici, vol IV, Wit 1, no. 21. J. F. G., Hawaii's Discovery by Spaniards: Theories Traced and Refuted, published in Papers of the Hawaiian Historical Society, no. 20 (1939), pp. 38–113.