Item #9552 Stato di Milano. G. A. MAGINI.
From the First Italian Atlas of Italy
Milan/ Northern Italy..
[Bologna, 1620]

Stato di Milano.

13 ½ x 18 ¼ inches, Fine original color, refreshed; printers crease reinforced; else excellent condition.

  A scarce, richly decorative map of the Duchy of Milan from the first Italian national atlas.  The Duchy – then a possession of the Spanish – is shown amidst powerful rivals, wedged between Piedmont/Savoy to the west, the Republic of Venice to the east, the Swiss Confederacy to the north, and separated from the Mediterranean by Monferrato to the south. 

            Magini’s landmark atlas, in which this map appeared, gathered the great Italian regional maps of the 16th and early 17th centuries -- those of the so-called ‘La Freri’ school -- into a single, unified format.  The work occupied a good part of Magini’s life, and, in fact, was published three years after his death by his son, Fabio.  Magini was innovative in the design of his maps; he was first in Italy to consistently employ Dutch-style cartouches and ornamentation as found on the maps of Mercator, Hondius and Ortelius.  This resulted in a uniformly rich visual style never seen before in Italian cartography, at least not in printed maps. One of the engravers who worked on the atlas is the noted English artisan, Benjamin Wright, who lived in Mantua and Bologna.

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