Atlas. PORCACCHI. L’isole più famose del mondo.

PORCACCHI, Tommaso. L’isole più famose del mondo… intagliate da Girolamo Porro con l’aggiunta di molte isole.

Venezia, appresso gli heredi di Simon Galignani, 1605

A copy with excellent provenance that belonged to Guicciotti, likely the secretary to Cardinal Pier Paolo Crescenzi and a friend of Giambattista Marino. Fourth edition in the variant with “1605” on the title page. This edition is identical to the second, with the addition of a few minor changes. In this famous atlas, Porcacchi depicts the world as a collection of islands. Girolamo Porro’s engravings focus on the Mediterranean and the Aegean Sea, but there are also references to distant lands, including the New World and the East. The work, in fact, also includes two general maps of the world, as well as maps of North America, Cuba, Hispaniola, Iceland, Ireland, and the Scottish islands.

Olschki Choix, 991; Michel, VI, p. 141.

Folio, 290x180 mm. Contemporary full vellum binding; handwritten title on spine. Pp. [24], 211, 1 blank. Woodcut initials and tailpieces. Engraved architectonic title page and 48 copper-engraved maps in the text. Ex Libris of Ippolito Guicciotti. The illustration of Iceland is printed upside down. Some occasional stains, restorations, damp stains on margin of last leaves with little restoration on white margin, some little defects.