The actual engraver of the map remains unknown, as “unlike most of the other foreign maps it carries no attribution and may have been prepared by the publisher of the work, George Humble, whose imprint appears on the map... The style is not inconsistent with that of 

 who worked on several other maps in the ‘Prospect’ and he may have been primarily responsible” (Shirley). 



 (1551-1629), was probably apprenticed as a rolling-press printer as a young man, and made free in September of 1580. His earliest cartographic works were historical, and included, in 1595, a wall map of the Holy Land, ‘Canaan as it was Possessed both in Abraham and Israels Dayes’, a two-sheet map of ‘The Invasions of England and Ireland with all their Civill Warres since the Conquest’ (1601) and a wall map of England, Wales and Ireland showing the same information (c1603–1604). Meanwhile, the individual maps for his first atlas were being prepared from about 1602. The plates were engraved by Jodocus Hondius from 1607, and George Humble was granted a privilege to print it for twenty-one years from 1608. The ‘History of Great Britaine’ (1611) and its companion atlas volume, the ‘Theatre of the Empire of Great Britaine’ (1612), were published together and “were an immediate success: three new editions and issues of each appeared during Speed's lifetime, and a miniature version was first published about 1619-20. The maps in the 'Theatre' became the basis for subsequent folio atlases until the mid-eighteenth century. By 1625 Speed had lost his sight. Nevertheless, in 1627 he published ‘A Prospect of the Most Famous Parts of the World’, which shared a title-page with the 1627 edition of the Theatre" (Bendall).

’s world atlas, ‘A Prospect of the Most Famous Parts of the World’ (1627), Speed's world map bears some similarities, both geographically and decoratively to William Grent's extremely rare broadsheet map of the world, published in London in 1625, as evidenced by the fact that Speed’s map also shows California as an island, includes the same four portraits of the circumnavigators, the same English legends, and similar astronomical drawings of eclipses and diagrams of the heavenly spheres. The four allegorical figures representing the elements, and celestial hemispheres are based on Jodocus Hondius’ world map of 1617.

There are a number of significant differences though, chiefly on the Northwest Coast of America and Japan. Speed has also rendered the coastlines of the vast conjectural ‘Magellanica or ‘The Southerne Unknowne Land’ considerably less emphatically than Grent. One of the several claims to fame for Speed's map is that it is the first available world map to represent California as an island. Speed has followed Grent in this but has adopted the shape for the ‘island’ from Henry Briggs’ map of North America, published, like the Grent, in London in 1625. It was the popularity and influence of Speed’s maps, both World and Americas, which did so much to insure the persistent longevity of this misconception.


 (1551–1629) was the son of a Merchant Taylor in London, who rose from his family occupation to become one of the more influential cartographers of his era. His earliest cartographic works were historical, and included, in 1595, a wall map of the Holy Land, ‘Canaan as it was Possessed both in Abraham and Israels Dayes’, a two-sheet map of ‘The Invasions of England and Ireland with all their Civill Warres since the Conquest’ (1601), and a wall map of England, Wales and Ireland showing the same information (c. 1603–1604). 

Meanwhile, the individual maps for his first atlas were being prepared from about 1602. The plates were engraved by Jodocus Hondius from 1607, and George Humble was granted a privilege to print it for twenty-one years from 1608. The ‘History of Great Britaine’ (1611) and its companion atlas volume, the ‘Theatre of the Empire of Great Britaine’ (1612), were published together and were an immediate success: three new editions and issues of each appeared during Speed's lifetime, and a miniature version was first published about 1619–1620. The maps in the 'Theatre' became the basis for subsequent folio atlases until the mid- eighteenth century. By 1625, Speed had lost his sight. Nevertheless, in 1627 he published ‘A Prospect of the Most Famous Parts of the World’, which shared a titlepage with the 1627 edition of the ‘Theatre’.

’s world map was the first English language map of its kind and the first to appear in an English atlas. The son of a merchant in London, Speed rose from his family occupation to become one of the most prominent scholars and cartographers of his era. Published near the end of Speed’s career, this world map compiles a host of cartographical information with a special focus on the English colonies in America, notably the first world map to mark the settlement of New Plymouth. The map presents the globe in a double hemisphere and is embellished with astronomical diagrams, allegorical representations of the seasons, and the portraits of famous navigators. 

Superb impression of the first edition, first state of 

’s iconic map, the world map from the first printed world atlas by an Englishman.

Double-page engraved copperplate double-hemisphere map of the world, with vignettes of alternative projections.

John Speed’s World Map