Arania Insula in aestuario Glottae - The Yle of Arren in the Fyrth of Clyd

Copper engraved map, from volume 5 of Blaeu’s Atlas, outlined in colour, twin decorative cartouches around title and scale, central vertical fold, slight offsetting, wide margins, latin text on verso, reinforced along fold ends, overall size 620 x 470mm, Amsterdam, 1654.

A charming map of the Isle of Arran, the largest Island in the Firth of Clyde, off the West Coast of Scotland. The detailed map shows villages, castles, mountains, lochs and rivers in great detail. This includes Brodrick Castle, adjacent to Brodrick Bay.The original survey work of Timothy Pont (and secondarily Robert Gordon) is behind the first atlas of Scotland published by Blaeu in 1654. Pont compiled this map for Blaeu between 1583 and 1601.

Joan Blaeu was a leading Amsterdam mapmaker. His prowess was recognised in the civil offices he held: from 1638, mapmaker to the Dutch East India Company and, between 1651 and 1672, a member of Amsterdam City Council. The maps of Scotland that form part of the Atlas novus are part of a scheme for a multi-volume world atlas, a scheme hatched by Joan’s father, Willem Janszoon Blaeu.

The Blaeu maps of Scotland are particularly scarce. Produced between 1654 and 1672, the year of the fire that destroyed the Blaeu printing house, is a much shorter period of time than most other Blaeu maps. A splendid and scarce map.