304.     [MAP]. [GULF OF MEXICO]. SPAIN. DEPÓSITO HIDROGRÁFICO DE MARINA. Carta Particular de las Cóstas Setentrionales del Seno Mexicano que comprehende las de la Florída Occidental las Márgenes de la Luisiana y toda la rivera que sigue por la Bahía de S. Bernardo y el Rio Bravo del Norte hasta la Laguna Madre. Construída y publicada de órden superior en la Dirección Hidrográfica. Madrid año 1807 [between title and seal] Notas…. [seal of the Dirección Hidrográfica at upper right, within a coil of rope and anchor, below which is legend] Preció 16. R^S. V^N. [at foot, below neat line] M. Moreno la del^o F. Selma la grab^ó Morata la esc^o. Madrid: Dirección Hidrografía, 1807. Copper-engraved map showing the northern coastline of the Gulf of Mexico beginning at Cape San Blas on the Gulf coast of Florida and extending as far as 24º 15’ on the Mexican coast, dissected into twelve sections, laid down on contemporary linen, neat line to neat line: 58.1 x 92 cm, folding to approximately 20 x 23.5 cm, detailed soundings provided, no graphic scale (but about 23 miles to the inch). A few light stains, corners of a few sections of the map separated from linen backing, outer edges of linen backing a little frayed, backing foxed, soiled, and with a few stains, overall a good copy. Contemporary ink note on verso: “Costa seno Mex^o. XI. C 7.”

     Martin & Martin 22B. This map descends from the 1799 Carta esférica (Martin & Martin 22A; see Item 303 herein). Jackson, Shooting the Sun II, Plate 56 (detail), pp. 499-500 (#34B) (detail). Lowery 744. Phillips, Atlases, 4155. Streeter 1041: “Like the Carta esférica [see Item 303 herein], this map shows only the lower courses of the Texas rivers. Here the river entering Galveston Bay is correctly named R. de la Trinidad, instead of R. Archisas, and there is still no Brazos River. In what is now the state of Louisiana, the Mississippi is shown to a little above ‘Fte de Natchez.’”

Martin & Martin, 22B, p. 105:

In 1807, a larger-scale, slightly revised chart, showing only the coast between the Rio Grande and the Mississippi, was issued as the Carta Particular de las Costas Setentrionales del Seno Mexicano…. Like the [1799] Carta esférica on which it is based, the Carta Particular was an improvement over the Jefferys chart, which it superseded. It showed the mouths and lower courses of six of the seven most important rivers of Texas; the Brazos, though, was curiously absent. Detailed soundings of all the coastal waterways were given. The Sabine River is shown as the boundary between Texas and Louisiana. The chart was by no means perfect…. In spite of relatively minor errors…the continued significance of the map was perhaps best indicated by the fact that nearly twenty years later, in 1825, the first president of the new Republic of Mexico, Guadalupe Victoria ordered an exact copy printed and distributed.

This 1807 detailed version of the coast is much more difficult to find than its 1799 predecessor that was published in four separate editions or issues.

($12,000-16,000)

Auction 22 Abstracts