Schwartz Collection Exhibition Opens Monday

Abraham Ortelius: Maris Pacifici (1589) Seymour I. Schwartz, author of five books on the history of cartography,* is pledging his collection to the University of Virginia, which, in turn, is naming its map room in his honour today. About 50 of those 225 maps go on display on Monday; the exhibition will run through January 17, 2009. From the press release (which also has samples of the collection): “Included are one of the oldest maps to show the western hemisphere (1508), the first map to show Florida (Hernando Cortés’s 1524 map of Mexico City), and an 18th century map of the Ohio River Valley drawn by then-unknown surveyor George Washington.” Via MapHist and Map History/History of Cartography.

* Those books being Putting “America” on the Map: The Story of the Most Important Graphic Document in the History of the United States (2007), about the Waldseemüller map; The Mismapping of America (2003), which sounds interesting; The Mapping of America (2001), with Ralph Ehrenberg; This Land is Your Land: The Geographic Evolution of the United States (2000); and The French and Indian War 1754-1763: The Imperial Struggle for North America (2000).

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