BENIN CITY NIGERIA 1686 DAPPER UNUSUAL ANTIQUE COPPER ENGRAVED CITY VIEW

Description: Striking and highly detailed copper engraved 1686 Olfert Dapper's copper engraved panoramic view of the city of Benin city, southern Nigeria. The view shows the city with his buildings, , streets, town walls, royal palace and surrounding landscape. Several inhabitants and two lettered keys in Dutch & French , both top lateral corners, adorn the map.
 
This plate was produced by Olfert Dapper and published by in the French edition of Description of Africa entitled Description de L'Afrique and published in 1686.
 
Source: Olfert Dapper. Description de l'Afrique, contenant Le Noms, la Situation & les Confins de toutes ses Parties, leurs Rivieres, leurs Villes & leurs Habitations, leurs Plantes & leurs Animaux; les Mœurs, les Coutumes. la Langue, les Richesses, la Religion & le Gouvernement de ses Peuples avec Dea Carte des Etats, des provinces & des Villes, & des Figures en taille-douce, qui representent les habits & les principales Ceremonies des Habitans, les Plantes & les ANimaux le moins connus. Traduite de Flammand d'O. Dapper, D. M. A Amaterdam: Chez Wolfgang, Waesberge, Boom & van Sometem, M. DC. LXXXVI

Description of Africa (Naukeurige Beschrijvinge der Afrikaensche Gewesten in the original archaic Dutch), first published in 1668, is an enthographic book which describes Africa. Written by the geographer Olmert Dapper and published by Jacob Van Meurs in two Dutch editions in 1668 and 1676, this work is considered to be one of the foundational works of African studies. Over the course of three years, Dapper consults numerous reports concerning the history and geography of the continent (as it was understood by 17th century Europeans) and travelogues. It is said that Dapper relied heavily on the records of the Dutch West India Company, although none of the original reports have been located by historians. In Description of Africa, per the Fondation Dapper, Dapper, 'far from passing judgement on the societies described and by avoiding ethnocentric connotations, was the first to apply an interdisciplinary approach, adroitly combining geography, economics, politics, medicine, and a study of culture.' Dapper did not write a 'work of exotic curiosities, but a work for posterity.' Description of Africa was published in English by John Ogilby in 1670 and a German translation appeared the following year. A French translation of the work was published in 1686.

Date: 1686 ( undated )

Dimension: Paper size approx.: cm 37,5 x 32,7

Condition: Very strong and dark impression on good paper.  Sheet with chains. Sheet uncolored. Wide margins. Small foxing and browning.  Conditions are as you can see in the images. 

Mapmaker: Olfert Dapper (1636 - December 29, 1689) was a Dutch geographer, polyglot, and historian. Born in Amsterdam, he attended the University of Utrecht, where he was registered as a student in 1658. Two years later he began signing doctor medicinæ, but there in no evidence that he ever received any medical training or education. Dapper published a five-volume book about the history of Amsterdam entitled, Historische Beschrijving der Stadt Amsterdam and in 1665 published a Dutch translation from the Greek of the Histories of Herodotus. His best-known work, Naukeurige Beschrijvingen der Afrikaensche gewesten (Description of Africa), was published in 1668 and subsequently published in English by John Ogilby in 1670 and in French in 1686. Although Dapper never traveled to Africa, he took advantage of numerous reports from adventurers in order to compile this authoritative work over the course of three years.