1832 Berghaus 'Atlas von Asia' Map of the Persian Gulf

First map to name Abu Dhabi.

This is Heinrich Berghaus's groundbreaking 1832 map of the Persian Gulf, identified by historian Cyrus Alai as 'the most detailed' map of the Gulf. Significantly, it is the earliest printed map to name Abu Dhabi (Abuthubbi / Bûthabîn / أبوظبي). The map was part of Berghaus's seminal Atlas von Asia, a loose-leaf collection of highly detailed regional maps of Asia, each an individual masterpiece of cartographic achievement.

A Closer Look

Coverage covers the Persian Gulf, from Basra (Bashra; ٱلْبَصْرَة) to Muscat (Maskat, Oman; مَسْقَط). There are six insets, most on the Iranian coast, but one covers Manama (الْمَنَامَة), then as now the capital of Bahrain (Bahrein, جزيرة البحرين). On the Qatar peninsula, it names the now ruined city of Zubarah (الزبارة) and Al Bidda (Doha; البدع). In the modern-day United Arab Emirates, it names Abu Dhabi (Abuthubbi, Bûthabîn; أبوظبي), Dubai (Debai; دبي), Sharjah (Scharga, إِمَارَة ٱلشَّارِقَة), Amelgawein (Umm Al Quwain, أم القيوين), Al Jazeera al Hamra (Djesirat el Amrah; الجزيرة الحمراء), and Ras Al-Khaimah (Ras el Khyma; رَأْس ٱلْخَيْمَة) - marking it as one of the first, if not the first to so comprehensively detail these coasts. Further north, near the Tigres and Euphrates Delta, Kuwait (El Koueit Grän; دَوْلَةُ الكويت) is identified. From Bushehr (Buschir, Iran; بوشهر), inland caravan routes are illustrated through 'Farsistan' as far as

Sources

Berghaus acknowledges the 'Officers of the Bombay Marine' for the work and maintained an active correspondence with the British hydrographer James Horsburgh, of which he wrote,

I stated that the depiction of the Persian Gulf was a reduced copy of my reduced chart of that Gulf (No. 12 of the Atlas). The attentive reader will also recall from the memoir accompanying that chart that its construction was based upon the investigations of the Bombay Marine, insofar as they had been made known by Horsburgh in his classic work. However, I had not seen the survey sheets themselves, which were not completed until the course of 1832, that is, a year after I had drafted my map.

Captain James Horsburgh was kind enough to send me, in the spring of 1833, the general chart of the Persian Gulf, compiled from the detailed survey sheets of the officers of the Bombay Marine. It is this general chart that served as the basis for the improved representation of the gulf on the Map of Arabia.

A comparison with the reduced chart of the Persian Gulf will show that, although the overall configuration and the geographical positions of the principal points are the same on both maps, a greater degree of precision could be achieved in the details. Furthermore, the gap in our knowledge of the Arabian coast between El-Katif (al-Qatif) and El-Koueit (Kuwait) has now been filled. (Berghaus, H., Geographisches memoir zur erklärung und erlaüterung der Karte von Syrien, (no. 5. Atlas von Asia) page 16.)

This map thus relies on the Bombay Marine surveys of George Barnes Brucks, G. M Guy, Robert Cogan, S. B. Haines, and W. E. Rogers. This work, at the time, existed only in manuscript, a copy of which was apparently supplied, in part or full, to Berghaus by Horsburgh, as the British chart itself (Alai, C., Special Map of Persia, #E291) was not printed until 1832, shortly after this Berghaus map was issued.

First Map ot Name Abu Dhabi

This is almost certainly the earliest printed map to name Abu Dhabi. There are only two other contenders for this title, neither of which is earlier. The first is the Persian Gulf map issued by the Admiralty Hydrographic Office in 1832 (the same year this map was issued, but, as above, later). The second is the Ehrenberg / Rüppell map of Arabia, Arabia und das Nil-Land, also part of Beghaus's Atlas von Asia, but issued in 1835 - 3 years later. (Incidentally, this map was offered in a heavily annotated version at the 2024 Abu Dhabi International Book Fair for 95,000 GBP.) The comparatively late appearance of Abu Dhabi on maps is not surprising. Unlike neighboring Dubai, recorded in print as early as 1590, Abu Dhabi was not settled until 1793, when the Bani Yas Bedouin moved to the island in search of fresh water. The first major surveys to follow were completed by the Bombay Marine in 1830; no other earlier cartography would have had new information about this coast. Consequently, this is one of the earliest printed maps to name Abu Dhabi. The significance of the present map to Abu Dhabi has likely gone unnoticed due to its exceptional rarity and lack of digitized examples.

Publication History and Census

This map was drafted by Heinrich Berghaus in 1831 and engraved by C. H. Herterich for publication in 1832. Today it is very rare. We note an example at Yale's Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, the Defensiebibliotheken, and several German libraries, but none in the Middle East. No market history.

Cartographers

Heinrich Karl Wilhelm Berghaus (May 3, 1797 - February 17, 1884) was a German (Prussian) geographer, linguist, and ethnologist who founded the Potsdam Geographische Kunstschule. He was born in Kleve, Germany, and, as a young man, trained as a surveyor. He put his training to work in 1811, working in the French Department of Lippe as a bridge and road engineer. When the Kingdom of Westphalia dissolved in 1813, he volunteered for the Prussian army administration, traveling with General Bogislav Friedrich Emanuel von Tauentzien (1760 - 1824) as far as Brittany. In 1816, he joined the staff of the Prussian trigonometrical survey, conducting surveys throughout the nation. Among his many accomplishments, Berghaus is credited with inventing the 'thematic atlas' in 1845. In addition to his own work, he trained some of the most important German geographers and cartographers of the late 19th century, including August Heinrich Petermann (1822 - 1878) and his nephew Hermann Berghaus (1828 - 1890). The elder Berghaus also was a friend and associate of the naturalist Alexander von Humboldt (1769 - 1859), producing some of the maps in his publications. In 1837, he inherited rights to Daniel Gottlob Reymann's (1759 - 1837) monumental Geographischer Specialatlas von Deutschland. Berghaus is best known for his own influential and wide-ranging atlases, namely Atlas von Asien, published between 1833 and 1837, and Berghaus' Physikalischer Atlas, published in multiple editions in the 1830s - 1840s. Although Atlas von Asien was a commercial failure, it was regarded as a work of supreme quality, boosting the reputation of the publisher Justus Perthes and setting up their next collaboration, Berghaus' Physikalischer Atlas, for success. In addition to his geographical work, Berghaus was also an accomplished linguist and ethnologist and published an important 1851 article on American Indian language and ethnology (Geographisches Jahrbuch, 1851).   Further Details...

C. H. Herterick (fl. c. 1825 - 1840) was a German engraver active in the first half of the 19th century. Herterick is mostly associated with the output of the Gotha-based Justus Perthes firm, including the works of Heinrich Berghaus (1797 - 1884), Carl Ritter (1779 - 1859), and Heinrich Kiepert (1818 - 1899).   Further Details...

Source

Berghaus, H., Atlas von Asien, (Gotha: Justus Perthes) 1832 - 1837.    

Heinrich Berghaus's Atlas von Asien was an 18-map loose-leaf atlas issued by Justus Perthes between 1832 and 1858. Of the 18 proposed maps, only 15 were published. Individual maps were large with unprecedented detail. These include 10 land maps and 7 nautical charts derived from British, Dutch, and Portuguese colonial, scientific, and diplomatic missions. Despite this, the project was a financial failure due to the high cost of engraving such large and intricate maps. It took more than 25 years for the maps to be fully published and, according to the Perthes archive, only 20 sets were ultimately bound and sold. The publication run per map ran between 200 to 550 maps, most of which were offered separately. The breadth, detail, and comprehensiveness of the work surpassed any previous mapping of the respective subjects. Although not a direct financial success, the Atlas von Asien was a monumental cartographic accomplishment that put the Perthes firm on par with the great cartographic firms of England and France. The Atlas von Asien was largely forgotten until recent times, when it has become desirable among collectors and institutions.

Condition

Excellent. Dissected and laid on original linen backing. Stable and clean.

References

Alai, C., Special Maps of Persia 1477-1925, E. 292, Pl. 167. Yale University, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, #534cea 1832. OCLC 248589175.