The Theatre of the Empire of Great Britaine. Presenting an Exact Geography of the Kingdomes of England. Scotland and Ireland and the Isles adjoyning..8029, viz. Asia, Africa, Europe, America with these Empires and Kingdoms therein

London: at the George in Fleet-street and at the Rose and Crown in St.Paul's Church-yard: Thomas Bassett & Richard Chiswell, 1676. Hardcover. Very Good. Elephant Folio - over 15 - 23" tall. SPEED John. Regarded as a landmark in the history of British topography In 18 century sheep, gilt edge tooling, tips repaired. Re-spined to style, raised bands, decorative gilt tooling, contemporary gilt/calf title label. Internally, engraved armorial frontispiece and additional decorative title, letterpress general title printed in red & black, part titles to books two, three and four printed in black (Wales, Scotland and Ireland) and letterpress title to 'Prospect' also printed in black, preliminary text leaves including dedication present, 'A New and Accurat Map of the World...,' erroneously bound in after the contents page of 'The Theatre', ninety-six (complete) uncoloured engraved maps (68 in the Theatre and 28 in the Prospect), [16], 2, 126, 5-6, 5-8 Civil wars, 10 leaves of roads, [1] Scotland tp, [1], 129-146 pp. Prospect f the World, 1676, [2], 3-56 pp, [11] index, several maps trimmed with slight loss to the strap-work margin, very occasional marginal closed tears and staining, lacking the maps of Berkshire, Derbyshire and Shropshire, but replaced with examples from the first edition of 1611, map of Derbyshire stained and toned, Spain torn with loss to the upper left right corner tip, Denmark torn with small area of loss to the right hand margin, each map with descriptive text to the verso, index bound at rear, additional armorial frontispiece and decorative title trimmed to neat line and attached to recto and verso of blank leaf and additional title page both loosely inserted, 18th-century bookplate of James Norman and old auction catalogue entry to the front paste down, front free endpaper with ink stamp of I. Pickersgill, ink name to tp (Cha Hillear). (415*274 mm).(ESTC R13825 . Wing S4886). Chubb, XXVII. John Speed's 'Theatre' is regarded as a landmark in the history of British topography. It was the first English attempt to produce a grand scale atlas, including the first maps of the provinces of Ireland. The 'Theatre' evolved into a world atlas with the addition of the 'Prospect' in 1627. The 1676 edition of the Prospect includes seven new maps which were not present in the 1627 edition: Virginia and Maryland, New England, Carolina, Jamaica and Barbados, East India, Russia and Canaan. (Signatures: [9], B2-D2, E, A, F-R, H1, T, V-2O, S1, Q2-3U, ***-***3, [10], 3X-3Z1, 4A-4E. Prospect [1], B-2e, 4f-4h2), with all maps printed on the inner forme of the register, and text printed on the outer forme.