England, Malta. DE PALMEUS - LATTRÉ. Carte Genéralé de la Principauté Souveraine de l'Isles de Malta et du Goze.

DE PALMEUS, Gervais - LATTRÉ, Jean. General Map of the Sovereign Principality of the Islands of Malta and Gozo.

1752

 

Copper engraving. Dimensions: 575 x 1345 mm. Titles and dimensions in cartouches. Copy in perfect condition.

 

The “Carte Genéralé de la Principauté Souveraine de l'Isles de Malta et du Goze” was drawn by De Palmeus based “sur le Mémoires des Grands Officiers de l’Ordre” and dedicated to Louis François de Bourbon Conti, who, on April 16, 1749, with the support of King Louis XV, had been appointed Grand Prior of France of the Order of Malta and, from 1752—the year the map was published—director of the king’s secret cabinet. This copy is not listed in the most recent in-depth study dedicated to De Palmeus’s work.

 

“Perhaps the most beautiful, the most detailed, the largest, and the most expensive printed maps of Malta are a set of three maps produced in Paris by Gervais de Palmeus”—this is how Albert Ganado, a renowned scholar and great collector of maps of Malta, described the work of Gervais de Palmeus in an article he wrote for the BIMCC titled “Maps of Malta, Focal Point of the Mediterranean.”