The first printed map of Radnor, Breconshire, Cardiganshire and Carmarthenshire

SAXTON, Christopher.

Radnor Breknok Cardigan et Caermarden quatuor australis Cambriae comitatuum (B. Dehenbart. A. Southwales) descriptio. An.o D.ni 1578.
London, 1579. Original colour. 370 x 480mm, sheet with grapes watermark.

The first published state of Saxton's map of Radnor, Breconshire, Cardiganshire and Carmarthenshire, the first time these four counties of South Wales had been represented on a printed map. It was engraved by Francis Scatter in 1578 and issued in Christopher Saxton's county atlas the following year, less than 50 years after Wales was officially incorporated into the Kingdom of Henry III by the 1536 Act of Union. The map has a large title cartouche top right featuring Elizabeth I's royal arms, a scale cartouche with Saxton's name bottom right, with the arms of Thomas Seckford, Elizabeth's Master of Requests, bottom left.
It was William Cecil, Lord Burghley, Elizabeth I's Secretary of State, who determined that England and Wales should be mapped properly, and Seckford who financed Saxton's work. Saxton was also issued with a Royal Warrant obliging Welsh officials to provide him with Welsh-speaking guides. The resulting surveys were the basis of county mapping until the middle of the 18th century, copied for Camden's 'Britannia' and the atlases of Speed, Blome and Morden. The printing plates also had a long lifespan: after being eclipsed by John Speed's atlas of 1611, the plates were re-engraved and re-issued in 1642 by William Web; most of the other plates were still being printed as late as 1770.


Stock ID : 21866