Vaugondy's famous map of the Pacific Northwest showing the purported discoveries of the Spanish Admiral Bartholomew de la Fonte in the mid 17th century.

Both de la Fonte and his discoveries have proved to be fictitious but at the time, they provided rich ground for rumour and speculation about the existence of the Northwest Passage.

Thomas Jefferys used this map in his work, "The Great Probability of a Northwest Passage". Vaugondy translated it into French and used this map as one of a series of ten maps focusing on the exploration and mapping of the Pacific Northwest as well as a record of the possible existence of the Passage. These ten maps formed part of a Supplement to Diderot's Encyclopaedia and are one of the earliest examples of comparative geography. 

Coloured. [AMER2429]