Americae Retectio

Acquired From: Leen Helmink

Colouring: Uncoloured

Condition: Good

Confirmed: 3/10/2022

Date Acquired: 15/5/2018

Dealers ID No.: 19046

Description: In the late 1580s, nearly a century after the travels of Christopher Columbus and Amerigo Vespucci, Jan van der Straet (also known in Italian as Giovanni Stradano and in Latin Johannes Stradanus) designed a series of engravings celebrating the Italian contribution to the discovery of the New World (the Americas), known as Americae Retectio (The Discovery of America). nVan der Straet sent the designs to Antwerp to be engraved by Adrian Collaert either in 1589 or no later than the following year. Philip Galle subsequently re-issued the series in 1592 to commemorate the anniversary of Christopher Columbuss discovery of the New World (the Americas). The series consists of a title-page and three separate engravings, arranged chronologically, depicting Columbus, Vespucci, and Ferdinand Magellan, aboard their ships and surrounded by mythological gods, sea nymphs, mermaids, sea monsters, and other wonders of the ocean. nIt is bound together in this single volume, with Nova reperta (New Inventions) ( #209).

Engraver: Collaert, Adrian

First published: Americae Retectio, Antwerp: Philip Galle, 1589

Mapmaker: Straet, Jan van der (1523-1605)

Price: Purchased with entry #209

Primary Category: Book/Atlas

Purchase Reference: Ledger 2022. Email 14/08/2018

Rarity: R1 Extremely rare – occasionally seen on the market

References: Joy Kenseth, ed., The Age of the Marvelous (Hanover: Hood Museum of Art, 1991), 22627. Marjolein Leesberg and Arnout Balis, The Collaert Dynasty, in The New Hollsteins Dutch and Flemish Etchings, Engravings and Woodcuts, 14501700 (Amsterdam: Sound & Vision, 2005), 18285.

Technique: Copper Engraving

This state: 1589

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