Americque Septentrionale

Famous map of North America, notable for its delineation of the Great Lakes and its portrayal of the island of California.

In 1657, Nicholas Sanson issued a quarto sized atlas focused on the New World. Five of the maps featured parts of North America. This is the general map of North America which is based on Sanson’s own larger map of the continent first published in 1650. This earlier, larger map is particularly notable as being the first cartographic document to feature any division of the Great Lakes, as seen here on this smaller example. The other notable geographical feature on both maps is the portrayal of California as an island.

Sanson’s maps were highly influential and widely emulated at the time. The issue of his 1650 map gave the myth of the island of California added impetus and cartographic credibility. Unusually, the same work issued in 1657 also included another map, focusing on the west coast and the island of California but in the depiction of that map, Sanson developed it cartographically by adding several promontories or “fingers” to the north coast.

The portrayal of the island of California also gave impetus to another great geographical myth, the existence of the Northwest Passage, a feature far more likely to exist if California was not a peninsula.

The example offered here is the 1683 edition of the map. [AMER2401]