As this work was intended largely as an administrative tool, only fifty copies of this atlas were ever printed. A copy was presented to Selim III; several copies were also presented to the high-ranking officials of the Empire, some were reserved for the library of Muhendishane (the military engineering school of the time), and the remaining were reserved for sale. However, during the ‘Alemdar Vakası’, an uprising of the janissaries in Constantinople during 15–18 November 1808, a fire at the warehouse of the press destroyed an unknown (unaccounted) number of the copies reserved for sale. Based on several estimates and accounting for the single maps (torn out from bound volumes of the atlas) sold or being sold worldwide, it is believed that a maximum of twenty complete examples could be present in libraries or in private collections whereas some sources suggest that there exist only ten complete and intact copies in the world. As such, it is one of the rarest printed atlases of historical value.

The Nazam-i Cedid (‘New Order’) included a series of reforms intended to modernise the Ottoman army and the administrative structure of the Empire. These reforms required foremost new standards in geography and cartography and necessitated the need for a ‘Cedid’ or new atlas. To create this, Efendi translated and copied the maps, except for the celestial chart, from his friend William Faden's ‘General 

’, a copy of which he had purchased during his time in London. 

The ‘Cedid 

’ includes a monochrome celestial chart and twenty-four hand-colored copper engraved maps of various parts of the world. The world map on a Mercator projection is centred on the Australian continent. As commonly depicted at the time, the mainland of Australia and Tasmania are shown as one landmass. All the continents are outlined in colour, with Asia and Australia a wash with yellow and the Americas with green. All map text such as title, placenames, and annotations are in Ottoman Turkish. The map also shows navigational routes explored by James Cook from 1768 to 1780.

’) was compiled by Mahmud Raif Effendi (fl. 1793–1808) who served as Secretary to the first permanent Ottoman Embassy in London. This embassy, established in 1793, was the first permanent embassy by the Ottoman Empire to any European country. The goals of the embassy were to strengthen diplomatic ties, collect European knowledge, and educate a small coterie of young Turkish noblemen in the ways of European courts. The move to establish permanent embassies was part of a much larger policy of reform, the Nazam-i Cedid (‘New Order’), instituted by Sultan Selim III in an attempt to modernise the Turkish government during a period of perceived Ottoman decline.

As a talented young bureaucrat with powerful friends in the Ottoman court, Efendi was the ideal candidate to serve on the ambassadorial staff to London. While he did not speak English, he did speak fluent French, the international language of diplomacy at the time, and was reportedly extremely charismatic. While in London he regularly met with King George III and Queen Charlotte, Prime Minister William Pitt the Younger, and Foreign Secretary William Grenville. He was a frequent guest at court and attended the Queen's Drawing-room most Thursdays, as well as several royal balls. 

Efendi's activities in London were hardly limited to attending court. He also developed important relationships with British Army officers, some of whom he would later fight alongside during the Napoleonic Wars. He also struck up a friendship with King George III's Royal Cartographer, William Faden whose work became the basis for Efendi’s atlas. 

’) was the first folio atlas printed in the Ottoman Empire. Only fifty examples were ever published of which only ten complete examples and seven partial examples are known to have survived. Efendi served as Secretary to the first permanent Ottoman Embassy in London where he made diplomatic ties and was exposed to European cartographic knowledge. After befriending William Faden, George III's Royal Cartographer, Efend copied many of the maps in Faden’s ‘General 

’ (except for the celestial chart) to create his ‘Cedid 

’. Faden’s maps were extremely accurate and contained the best contemporary knowledge available to the British government, and Efendi’s translation proved to be highly influential in the Ottoman Empire.  

The ‘Cedid 

This exceedingly rare world map from Mahmud Raif Effendi's ‘Cedid 

 - the first folio atlas printed in the Ottoman Empire. Only fifty examples of the ‘Cedid 

’ were ever printed, of which only ten complete examples, and seven partial examples, are known to have survived in institutional collections.

Double-page engraved copperplate map of the world, on a Mercator projection, with contemporary hand-colour in full.

[Map of the World on Mercator’s Projection]

Mahmud Raif Effendii; translated by Yakovakı Efendi 

The World Map from the first Islamic Atlas of the World