An important early map of the Americas

An important map of the Western Hemisphere, published in 'Americae Pars Sexta sive Historiae ab Hieronymo Bezono' (the sixth part of De Bry's 'Grand Voyages'), which continued Girolamo Benzoni's account of his travels in the Americas. The map shows North and South America within a circle, supported on a frame alongside full-length portraits of New World explorers (Amerigo Vespucci, Christopher Columbus, Fernando Magellan and Francisco Pizarro) with maps and compasses. The cartography is based primarily on the Petrus Plancius World map of 1594. In the far north is Mercator's concept of the Arctic, a clear Northwest Passage, 'Frobisher's Strait' across Greenland and his 'Buss Island'. The St Lawrence River is shown, with Hochelaga, the Iroquoian fort near Montreal, but with no sign of Great Lakes. The position of Virginia is corrected, moving it further south, and St Augustine makes one of its first appearances on a general map. On the West Coast are the Strait of Anian and a Californian peninsula, before the myth of it being an island. In South America Cusco and Potosi, the mountain of silver, are marked, with the Strait of Magellan the only route into the Pacific. The Great Southern Continent, here called 'Terra Australia Magellanica', almost reaches the Equator near the Solomon Islands.