Carte physique et politique de l'Afrique

A fine example of the first edition of Brué’s large scale map of Africa. The map is from Brué’s Atlas physique et politique des cinq parties du monde published by the well known political author and publisher Goujon. The map underwent numerous updates, being published by Andriveau and Goujon.  Recently, the map has been geo-referenced at Stanford University (https://purl.stanford.edu/yz255xy4422 ).

It depicts how little Europeans knew of the geography of Africa, physical or political, in the early 1820s. Although there is detail of the Sub-Saharan territories which Europeans had colonised (e.g. West Africa, Congo, South Africa and Mozambique) it reveals just how little was known about large parts of Africa. Lake Maravi (Malawi / Nyasa) is shown with its uncertain northern extent (as Livingstone only explored the lake more than three decades later).

The map shows the phantom island of Saxemburg Island, in the south-western Atlantic (about 30S, 30W).

The prime meridian is Paris, taken by Royal decree, to be 20 degrees east of Ferro Island in the Canaries.

Reference: Norwich #127