Bellin's Map of Nagasaki

Plan du Port et de la Ville de Nangasaki

This is a plan of the port city of Nagaski, one of Japan’s chief points of contact with the outside world during the seclusion era. Prominent in the centre of the map is Dejima, the artificial island in Nagaski harbour, from which the Dutch were allowed to trade (after the expulsion of the Portuguese in the 17th century). 

The map was engraved for Charlevoix’s 1736 work on Japan adapted from Kaempfer’s sketch but our example, with engraver’s name bottom left and volume and page information bottom right (rather than top right), is from Prévost. 

Jacques Nicolas Bellin the elder (1703-1772) was first chief hydrographic engineer of the Dépôt des cartes, plans et journaux du Ministère de la Marine, charged by Louis XIV with mapping the coasts of France first and then the rest of the world. He was also a member of the Royal Society of London. 

Bellin compiled the maps for Prévost's Histoire Générale des Voyages. He later reworked them for his Petit Atlas Francaise and his Petit Atlas Maritime.

Condition & Materials 

Copper engraving, 21 x 35 cm, engraved by Guillaume Dheulland, modern hand colour, blank verso.

References 

C.f. Walter, Japan, 100 and 101