Mercator Magnets

From Rand McNally, a terrestrial map designed to be cut out and placed on a globe, in full color.

Antique map of the Western Hemisphere featuring the Americas originally made by Michael Mercator in 1595. America sive India Nova. The inserts show Cuba, Haiti and the Gulf of Mexico. Acanthus leaves surround the map.

Vintage illustration antique map Japonia, Iaponia by Gerardus Mercator and Jodocus Hondius, 1606 featuring parts or the far east with the three main islands of Japan and includes Korea as an island and parts of China on the mainland. The map is embellished with sea monsters, a Japanese junk and a Dutch galleon ship in the Chinese Ocean.

Antique old world map of Asia by Gerardus Mercator, 1613. Asia ex magna orbis terre descriptione Gerardi Mercatoris desumpta studio et industria G.M. Iunioris.

Title page of the Gerardus Mercator and Jodocus Hondius antique maps atlas of 1633 showing the Titan Atlas supporting the globe.

Earth from space. Cloudless satellite image of the whole Earth, shown in Mercator flat projection. North is at top. The colours of the land approximate to natural tones, whilst blue colour-codes represent ocean topography. Mercator projection causes an exaggeration of east-west distances in the polar regions. This image was compiled from data acquired by NOAA weather satellites over eleven ten-day periods at an altitude of 833 kilometres to give a resolution of 1 kilometre.

Vintage illustration antique South Asian map by Jodocus Hondius for the Gerardus Mercator Atlas, 1606. India Orientalis. This old world map of southeast Asia extends from India to the coasts of Southern China with the Pearl River Estuary, Canton and Formosa, it also includes all of the Malay peninsula and Indochina, northern Borneo and the Philippines, Japan and China. The decorative detail includes a large sea monster and an oriental junk in the Bay of Bengal as well as fine scroll work title and scale cartouches.

Antique map of the Turkish Empire and Ottoman Empire by Frederick de Wit featuring the Eastern Mediterranean, Greece, and Italy in the West and Saudi Arabia, the Persian Gulf and Caspian Sea in the east and centered on Turkey and Cyprus.

Antique old world double hemisphere map by Rumold Mercator, 1587. Orbis Terrae Compendiosa Descriptio Quam ex Magna Universali Mercatoris, MDLXXXVII

Vintage illustration antique world map featuring a view from the North Pole including the Arctic Circle, ocean and surrounding continents by Gerardus Mercator, 1595.

Antique old world map featuring the Americas by Nicolaes Visscher, 1658. The map shows North and South America, California as an island and Greenland at the top. The upper cartouche is a dedication for Cornelius Witsen. Novissima et accuratissima totius Americae descriptio per Nicolaes Visscher.

Vintage illustration aerial antique street map featuring a town plan of the European city of Amsterdam, the Netherlands, in the northern province of Holland. By cartographer Gerardus Mercator, 1633. There are ships in the harbor, streets, buildings and a wall surrounding the city for protection. Decorative insets feature landmarks and buildings of interest.

Nova Orbis Tabula in Lucem Edita by Frederick de Wit, c. 1665. Antique old world map featuring a double hemisphere with two polar projections and scenes of the four seasons and signs of the zodiac in the corners.

Frisland, also called Frischlant, Friesland, Frislanda, Frislandia, or Fixland, is a phantom island that appeared on virtually all of the maps of the North Atlantic from the 1560s through the 1660s. Frisland appears to have been born out of the confusion between an imaginary island and the actual southern part of Greenland. Frisland originally may also have been a cartographic approximation of Iceland, but in 1558 the influential Zeno map charted the landmass as an entirely separate island south (or occasionally south-west) of Iceland.

Vintage illustration antique world map featuring the Americas, 1597 by Theodor de Bry. The map includes North, South and Central America, the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans and is surrounded by people, explorers in the four corners who are reading maps and helping ships to navigate and travel the world.

Vintage illustration antique old world double hemisphere map by John Seller, 1673, originally published as part of his ‘Atlas Maritimus’, or A Book of Charts. Novissima Totius Terrarum Orbis Tabula. This map combines seasonal, zodiacal and symbolical scenes with astronomical diagrams and two pictures of the surface of the moon.

A Modern and Complete Map of the World by the Royal Mathematician Oronce Fine of the Dauphiné, 1534. Orontius Finnaeus. Recens et integra orbis descriptio. Orontius F. Delph Regi mathematic facebiat

Antique old world map of Europe by Gerard and Rumold Mercator, 1595 includes an elegant cartouche in the lower right corner. Europa, ad magnæ Europæ Gerardi Mercatoris P. imitationem / Rumoldi Mercatoris F. cura edita ; servato tamen initio longitudinis ex ratione magnetis, quod Pater in magna sua universali posuit.

Vintage illustration antique heart shaped world map by Petrus Apianus, 1520. This map is thought to be the first map to use the name America. Tipus Orbis Universalis iuxta Ptolemei Cosmographi Traditionem et Americi Vespucii Aliorque Lustrationes a Petro Apiano Leysnico Elucbrat An. Do. MDXX

Vintage illustration antique world map of the Americas by Abraham Ortelius, 1570. Abraham Ortelius was a Flemish cartographer and geographer, generally recognized as the creator of the first modern atlas, the Theatrum Orbis Terrarum (Theatre of the World). He is also believed to be the first person to imagine that the continents were joined together before drifting to their present positions. A beautiful ornate cartouche with the title Americae Sive Novi Orbis No Va Sescriptio is in the corner.

Vintage illustration antique world map by Frederick De Wit, 1668. Nova Totius Terrarum Orbis Tabula. The double hemispheres feature the island of California and shorelines of western Australia and New Zealand, Southeast Asia, and includes Terra Esonis, the mythical land bridge which virtually connects Japan and California. The scenes surrounding the map are by Dutch artist Romeyn de Hooghe and represent the four elements. Fire is shown by war and destruction; air by the heavens; earth by harvesting and husbandry; and water by ships, a spouting whale and mermaids. There are groups of figures between the hemispheres and polar projection maps are above and below the atlas.

Antique old world double hemisphere map by Joan Blaeu, 1662. Nova Et Accuratissima Totius Terrarum Orbis Tabula. Auctore Ioanne Blaeu. Featuring allegorical figures along the bottom depicting the four seasons, celestial figures along the top, and portraits of the astronomer Galileo Galilei in the upper left and Tycho Brahe in the upper right.

Vintage illustration 17th century antique map by Hendrik Hondius, 1630. Nova Totius Terrarum Orbis Geographica AC Hydrographica Tabula. In addition to the hemispheres, continents and oceans, this old world map features portraits of Claudius Ptolemy, Gerardus Mercator, Jodocus Hondius Flander and Julius Caeser in the ornate decorative corners.

Vintage illustration heart shaped antique world map by Petrus Apianus (aka Peter Apian), 1530. Petrus Apianus was a German humanist, known for his works in mathematics, astronomy and cartography. The lunar crater Apianus is named in his honor.

Vintage illustration antique world map featuring the Americas by Jodocus Hondius (aka Jodocus Hondius the Elder), 1606.

Vintage illustration antique old world double hemisphere map by Frederick de Wit (1629/30-1706). Terrarum Orbis. This antique map features the Eastern and Western Hemispheres as well as the north and south poles. The baroque style illustrations in the corners represent the four elements: Fire with Pluto carrying off Persephone, attended by Cerberus, the three-headed guardian of Hades, as a battle scene rages in the background; Air as the heavenly realm ruled by Zeus and Hera, who are surrounded by winged creatures and other gods; Water with the sea god Neptune, mermen, a spouting whale, and sailing ships in the distance; and Earth represented by a scene with fauns presenting three goddesses with fruits of the harvest and livestock.

Antique Map of the Americas by John Speed, 1626. America with those known parts in that unknowne worlde both people and manner of buildings discribed and inlarged by John Speed, 1626.

Antique old world heart shaped map with faces emulating the wind.

Antique Old World Map by Joan Blaeu, c. 1630. The Nova Totius Terrarum Orbis Geographica Ac Hydrographica Tabula or “A New Geographic and Hydrographic Depiction of All the Lands of the World” was created by Willem Blaeu in Amsterdam in 1630.

Vintage illustration antique map of Africa by Hondius and Jansson, 1635. Africae nova Tabula. This map is filled with fictitious rivers and mountains with the origin of the Nile conforming to the Ptolemaic tradition of twin lakes located below the equator. The Kingdom of Monomotapa fills the entire southern tip of Africa which is now shown as more rounded. The border includes insets with 10 sets of costumed figures, representing the indigenous peoples of Africa and six city views along the top. The cartouche has a clock with Roman numerals and a bell, the face of the clock is a skull surrounded by the rays of the sun.

Vintage illustration antique world map by Willem Jansz Blaeu, c1617 featuring the European continent and some surrounding areas of Africa, Asia and the Atlantic Ocean, c. 1617. This chart is surrounded by city scenes and people dressed in traditional costumes.

Vintage illustration antique map of the Americas by Johannes De Ram (1648-1693), c. 1685. A distinct characteristic of this map shows California as an island. The insert in the upper left includes some mythological figures with an angel, the insert in the lower left shows a scene with Natives. Novissima et Accuratissima Totius Americae Descriptio per Ioannem De Ram

Vintage illustration antique world double hemisphere map Pieter Goos, 1666 featuring birds flying towards a shining sun casting rays over the hemispheres and continents. Below the chart is a set of allegorical figures representing the four seasons, summer, autumn, spring and winter. Orbis terrarum nova et accuratissima tabula.

Vintage illustration Baroque Era antique old world map Atlas Frontispiece (the title page for an atlas c. 1650). Atlas is holding up the world while cartographers and explorers are studying maps below him.

Vintage illustration antique world map featuring both hemispheres by Claude Auguste Berey, 1688 featuring the Eastern and Western Hemispheres, as well as, the north and south poles and all of the continents. Text boxes circle the hemispheres of this atlas, an ornate golden border decorates the edges and a decorative scroll is at the top.

Vintage illustration antique world map detail by artist Martin Waldseemüller ( c. 1470-1520) featuring Claudius Ptolemy and the wind blowing from the west, several continents (Africa, Asia and Europe) and blue oceans and seas.