Whole of Yorkshire

51x44 cm

An ACCURATE MAP of the COUNTY of YORK Divided into its RIDINGS, and Subdivded into WAPONTAKES. Drawn from SURVEYS with various —Improvements.— By Eman: Bowen Geog,,^r to His late Majesty.
London: Printed for Carrington Bowles N.^o69 in S.^t Pauls Church Yard _ John Bowles N.^o13 in Cornhill _ Rob.t Sayer, & John Bennett, N.^o53 in Fleet Street, as the Act directs, 1 June,1777. —

This series of maps, produced for The Royal English Atlas, were a reduction by two thirds of the maps from The Large English Atlas and were first published in 1763 three years after the first complete issue of the Large English Atlas. There were a number of re-issues in the 1770's and 1780's with the final publication in 1828 by R. Martin. It is clear from the scarcity of surviving examples that the work was not a commercial success and the issues were small.

The engraver, Emanuel Bowen (1693?-1767), born in Wales, the son of Owen Bowen, gentleman, of Talley, Carmarthen and his wife Anne. He worked in London from about 1720 to 1767 and was very prolific, engraving plates for many important works including Britannia Depicta, A Complete System of Geography, the London and Universal magazines, Harris' Complete Collection of Voyages, Universal History of the World and many of the maps in The Large English Atlas, The Royal English Atlas and Atlas Anglicanus. He was appointed engraver of maps to George II and Louis XV. His daughter Sarah married his apprentice Thomas Kitchin (1719-1784) who worked with Emanuel Bowen on many works including this, The Royal English Atlas. Emanuel Bowen died aged about 74 "reduced by family extravagances, and almost blind through age" (Gough).

Some overall toning and some staining from an old mount around the border. The plain reverse is evenly browned. Bottom margin is small with the paper edge just meeting the plate line at the right corner. The map is in original outline hand colour and a strong dark impression on heavy paper from the second edition published from 1778. A very good example of a rare map.