Product Description
A beautifully preserved antique 1802 world map titled Mappemonde en Deux Hémisphères, engraved by P.F. Tardieu with contributions from leading geographical works of the era. Published in Paris by Hyacinthe Langlois as part of the Nouvel Atlas Universel de Géographie Ancienne et Moderne (prepared for the Nouvelle Édition de la Géographie de Guthrie), this map captures the scientific and artistic spirit of early 19th-century cartography.
The composition presents two finely engraved hemispheres:
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Western Hemisphere (Hémisphère Occidental ou Nouveau Monde) – depicting the Americas with contemporary and historical place names.
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Eastern Hemisphere (Hémisphère Oriental ou Ancien Monde) – showing Europe, Africa, Asia and Australia, combining ancient and modern geography.
Delicate hand-coloured boundaries outline continents and territories, while finely engraved details record mountain ranges, rivers, and major seas and oceans. The cartographic style combines precision and decorative artistry, characteristic of French Revolutionary-era atlases.
This sheet (map size approx. 56.2 × 41.5 cm, frame size 63 × 55 cm) remains in very good vintage condition, showing expected early paper qualities such as minor age-related foxing, slight fold lines, edge wear, and a tiny pinhole in the left centre, all consistent with over two centuries of history and enhancing its authenticity.
A significant artefact for collectors of antique maps, this double-hemisphere world map offers a vivid window into how the globe was understood at the dawn of the 19th century, blending scholarly geography with elegant design.
If This Piece Could Talk
It would speak of an age when the world was still being charted and the boundaries of continents were alive with mystery. Printed in Paris in 1802, when France measured time by the Revolutionary calendar, this Mappemonde en Deux Hémisphères would recall the quiet scratch of an engraver’s burin and the careful hand-colouring that brought seas and empires to life. It might whisper of scholars and explorers debating new discoveries, of salons where talk turned to distant oceans and the promise of trade and science. Two centuries on, the gentle foxing and soft patina are the marks of a long voyage through history—proof of the many eyes that have traced its lines in wonder. To stand before it today is to share in that spirit of curiosity and adventure, seeing the world as it was imagined at the dawn of the nineteenth century.