Art News

Daniel Crouch Rare Books to exhibit the first atlas printed in colours at the Miami International Map Fair

LONDON.- Daniel Crouch Rare Books, leading specialist in rare maps and atlases, will be exhibiting two fine and rare cartographic works at the Miami International Map Fair; by Ptolemy, and Jesuit monk Ferdinand Verbiest. Ferdinand Verbiest, (known as Nan Huairen in Chinese) was a Flemish Jesuit missionary in China, who became a close friend and aid to the Kangxi Emperor. Verbiest was highly skilled in astronomy, mathematics, and geometry, and successfully introduced European astronomy to China. Daniel Crouch will be exhibiting his ‘Wall Map of the Western Hemisphere’ (1674) ($130,000) – one of the largest maps of the western hemisphere ever printed. It combines Chinese and European cartographic knowledge of the globe at that time. Panels of Chinese characters offer geographical information and even non-Chinese place-names are written in Chinese characters, either as phonetic conversions or by translat