William Cecil, Lord Burghley’s own copy of this wonderful folio of hand-coloured engraved maps, with his signature on the title-page and notes in his hand on several others.
This includes the reverse of the map of France where the names and details of his complex European network of spies are recorded.
Beneath his signature appears the distinctive hand of Brownlow, 9th Earl of Exeter (1725-1793), asserting that, ‘this Book belong’d to the Ld. Treasurer Burghley.’
Also within the folio are five other manuscript maps:
a double-page map on vellum of the Northern Hemisphere by, or after, John Dee,
a portolan-type map on vellum of the Western Approaches from Gibraltar to the Irish Sea and extending west to the Azores, signed Robert Norman, 1581,
two coloured 17/18th Century maps of Cornwall and a coloured 17/18th Century map of Northern Holland with the Zuider Zee.
The volume measures: 29.4cm x 41.7cm x 4.3cm.
The Dee map: 32.8cm x 52cm.
