INDIA/CEYLON, Penisola Dell'Indo Di Qua Del Gange E L'Isola Di Ceilan Nell'Indie Orientali . . [Southern India and Sri Lanka]

A fine, very rarely contempory colored map by Coronelli !

Fine map of India below the Tropic of Cancer, with insets of Ceylon and Trincomalee. The insets are enclosed in decorative borders and the map is further embellished with a coat of arms held aloft by a cherub. From an oldcolored Italian composite atlas, but otherwise usually to be found in Coronelli’s Corso Geografico Universale published in Venice in 1690, or similar works . .

Vincenzo Maria Coronelli is widely recognised as one of Italy's most famous and greatest cartographers. He received an ecclesiastical education at the convent of the Minor Conventuals and also studied theology in Rome. However, his interests in geography and cartography were awoken early in his ecclesiastical career and never suppressed. He made very famous globes (including an impressive very large-scale pair for Louis XIV) and some of the most interesting and decorative atlases of all 17th century like Atlante Veneto, Isolario, Corso Geografico Universale, Libro dei Globi and also some pocket books about towns and islands. These important works are all finely engraved in his unique style with high quantity of toponymic and historical information. In 1680 Coronelli also founded the oldest surviving geographical society “The Argonauts Accademy”.