One of the Most Striking & Unusual, Early World Maps With Beautiful Early Color

BUNTING, Heinrich. [Magdeburg, 1581]

World/ Jerusalem.  BUNTING, H.  [Magdeburg, 1581]  Die gantze Welt in ein Rieberblat…10 ¼ x 14 ¼ inches.  Fine early color, refreshed; excellent condition with full margins.                                                                               

An exceptional, full-margined example of one of the most distinctive cartographic curiosities ever produced: a woodcut, cloverleaf-shaped map of the world with Jerusalem at the center.   With rich early color, which is very rarely seen on woodcuts of the 16^th century.

The map echoes the style of medieval mappae mundi, with Jerusalem at its center and each of the leaves of the trefoil representing the continents of Asia, Africa and Europe in an approximate T shape.  America occupies the lower lefthand corner, and the Red Sea is named in the notch between Africa and Asia.  Bunting’s is the only map available to the collector today with this striking configuration.  The map’s design is in fact a celebration of the cartographer's native city of Hanover, whose trefoil arms provided its inspiration. However, the map’s placement of Jerusalem at its center reflects the city’s pivotal role in Christian thinking toward the end of the 16th century and also highlights the subject of the book in which the map was published, Itinerarium Sacrae, which was a study of the Holy Land.  

Shirley 142; Nebenzahl, Maps of the Holy Land, pp. 88-9.

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