1708 De l'Isle / Schenk Map of North America

A truly beautiful original color example of Peter Schenk's 1708 edition of De L'Isle's foundational 1700 map of North America. Although derivative of De L'Isle, the map is richly decorative with a wealth of intriguing cartographic anomalies and tidbits.

A Closer Look

The map embraces North America from Baffin's Bay southwards as far as the Spanish Main, westwards to Cape Mendocino, and eastwards to include the Azores and the Sargasso Sea. This map is faithful to the De L'Isle, up to and including the themes and positioning of the title cartouche and the mileage scales.

A Cautious Reassessment of California

De l'Isle's map was the first to retreat from the 17th-century canard of insular California. The punctilious and cautious De l'Isle left the Pacific coast blank beyond Cape Mendocino, leaving the coastline incomplete at the northern terminus of the Gulf of California. Thus, in the absence of direct evidence of the coastlines, De l'Isle made no pronouncement: a more scientifically sound approach than the majority of maps from the preceding century. De l'Isle himself explained that he preferred to avoid premature conclusions on the uncertain matter,

... therefore I have made California neither an Island nor a part of the Continent, and I will stay with this point of view until I have seen something more positive than I have seen to date.

On the west coast of California, a false bay is shown, with the French notation 'Gulf of which nothing has yet been discovered but the moderns believe to be very deep.' It is not clear which 'moderns' De l'Isle had in mind, although De Fer's maps showed a bay at this latitude nearly bisecting the island.

Further north along the coast, San Diego, Seyo, Cape Mendocino, Francis Drakes Port, and the English claim of New Albion are noted. Both Mexico and New Mexico are mapped with sophistication, identifying mines, indigenous peoples, mountains, rivers, and the missions of Santa Fe, Taos, and San Antonio de Senecu (El Paso).

A State-of-the-Art American Interior

The Mississippi Valley is well developed and based upon the most advanced French information available. The forts of St. Louis and Bon Secours are noted, as is the settlement of d'Iberville at Bilocxhy (Biloxi). The Great Lakes are beautifully drawn, largely following the Coronelli model. The concentration of French power in the region is evident with forts at Tadousac, Quebec, Sorel, Montreal, and Frontenac.

A French North America

While De l'Isle was scientific and cautious in his expression of geographical detail, he was not so circumspect in his political statements. His delineations of the borders between French and English territories in the lands east of the Mississippi make it clear that De l'Isle considered England's empire in North America to be coastal, confining the English colonies to a narrow strip of land east of the Alleghenies, and limited to the River and Fort of Kinibeki (Kennebec) at their northern border. Nevertheless, Boston, Nantucket, Long Island, Manhattan, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Jamestown, Roanoke, Charlestown, and St. Augustine are identified along the eastern seaboard.

Atlantic Details

At sea, there are a couple of elements of note. This is the first printed mapping of the Sargasso Sea, here identified as the 'Mer de Sargasse' where 'Icy flottent des herbes mais en moindre quantité'. In the midst of the Sargasso Sea, he maps 'I de st. Borodon', a phantom named after Saint Brendan of Clonfert, which appears on maps as early as 1492. Along the Mexican and California coastline, the routes of various navigators, including Olivier, Cortez, Gaetan, Mendonza, and Francis Drake, are delineated.

A Curious Apocryphal Island

Just to the east of Barbados, in the Antilles, a curious apocryphal island appears with the label 'I. de Fonseca selon Quelquesuns.' This island, which is here surrounded by dangerous rocks and reefs, appears in maps as early as Hondius' Americae Novissima Descriptio, where it is identified as Y. de S. B. This island was also identified by M. Rochette with the label Galissioniere's Rock. Other ships, including the Rainbow, claim to have seen the island as late as 1822. De L'Isle was the first to give the map a definite name, Fonseca. Even so, with so few sightings, it disappeared from most maps in the early 18th century. Some scholars have speculated that the supposed sightings resulted from at discolored water occasionally discharged by the nearby Orinoco River.

Sanson?

An odd feature of this map's title is the reference, in the cartouche, to the atlas of Nicolas Sanson - who died in 1667 and whose geography for this region had been obsolete 20 years prior to De l'Isle's 1700 map. Sanson's maps of North America bore no resemblance to De l'Isle's work. To be fair, Sanson was, in his day, a towering geographical authority, and his reputation was such that Schenk's atlas (in this map would be inserted) was titled Atlas Contractus sive Mapparum Geographicarum Sansoniarum auctarum et correctarum nova congeries. Schenk would not be the only turn-of-the-century map publisher to drop the great geographer's name amongst collections of otherwise unassociated map, and indeed, there exist copies of De l'Isle's North America attributed to Sanson in the imprint.

Publication History and Census

This map was engraved for Pierre Schenk for publication in the 1708 Atlas Contractus. It appears occasionally on the market, but rarely in so beautiful an example.