Pierre du Val (1619–1683) was a French cartographer and geographer, important for helping to shape the distinctive, text-rich style of mid-seventeenth-century Parisian atlas and wall-map production. Working in an era when French mapmaking sought to rival the great Dutch houses, he became known for clear compilation, careful titling and the broad dissemination of contemporary geographical ideas in an accessible format.

Du Val was a nephew of the influential geographer Nicolas Sanson, from whom he drew both training and a substantial body of geographic intelligence. Much of Du Val’s output sits within the Sanson tradition: maps constructed from compiled sources, prioritising political and administrative geography, and frequently issued with extensive notes and explanatory material.

He produced a wide range of maps of the world, continents and individual regions for separate issue and for inclusion in atlases. His work was widely circulated and often reissued, making him a significant conduit through which French geographical scholarship reached a broader European readership in the second half of the seventeenth century.

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