1875 Meiji 8 Japanese Map of the World
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Description: An exceedingly rare find. This is a Japanese map of the world dated to the 8th year of the Emperor’s Meiji’s reign, or 1897. Depicts the entire world on a hemisphere projection with smaller polar projections in the upper left and right quadrants. The national boundaries and geography in general is vague, as is common to Japanese maps of this period. Color coded according to region with Japan itself in bright red. Several harbor plans and views adorn the bottom portions of the map. All text in Japanese. Folds into its original boards.
Date: 1875 (dated: Meiji 8)
Source: Pocket Map (Independent Issue)
Cartographer: Japanese cartography appears as early as the 1600s. Japanese maps are known for their exceptional beauty and high quality of workmanship. Early Japanese cartography has its own very distinctive projection and layout system. Japanese maps made prior to the appearance of Commodore Perry and the opening of Japan in the mid to late 1850s often have no firm directional orientation, incorporate views into the map proper, and tend to be hand colored woodblock prints. This era, from the 1600s to the c. 1855, which roughly coincides with the Tokugawa or Edo Period (1603-1886), some consider the Golden Age of Japanese Cartography. Most maps from this period, which followed isolationist ideology, predictably focus on Japan. The greatest cartographer of the period, whose work redefined all subsequent cartography, was Ino Tadataka (1745 -1818). Ino's maps of Japan were so detailed that, when the European cartographers arrived they had no need, even with their far more sophisticated survey equipment, to remap the region. Later Japanese maps, produced in the late Edo and throughout the Meiji period, draw heavily upon western maps as models in both their content and overall cartographic style. While many of these later maps maintain elements of traditional Japanese cartography such as the use of rice paper, woodblock printing, and delicate hand color, they also incorporate western directional orientation, projection systems, and structural norms. Click here for a list of Japanese maps.
Size: Printed area measures 36 x 28 inches (91.44 x 71.12 centimeters)
Condition: Good condition. Original folds exhibit some wear and intersection loss. Original boards. Else clean.
Code: World-meiji8-1875 (Necessary for phone inquiries: 646-320-8650)
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