Rare Official Spanish Blue Backed Sea Chart of the Bay of Biscay (Biscaya)

First edition of this fine sea chart, created by Juan Ferrer and engraved by Fernando Selma for the Spanish Hydrographical Department in 1803.

The chart extends from the coastline of Galicia in Northwestern Spain to Vizcaya (the Spanish Basque Coastline), then northward along the French coastline to Bretagne, before turning west and tracing the coastline of France and Belgium north to the region named as Republica Batava (Zeeland, in the Netherlands). Across the channel the southern part of England is shown, from Cornwall and Bristol Channel in the west, to the mouth of the Thames River, London and Essex, in the east.

At the bottom right, a section of the Mediterranean coastline is shown, from the Perpignan region of France to the Liburia region of Italy, covering all of the French Riviera, Marseilles, etc.

Juan Ferrer y Franch was a well respected chartmaker from Menorca, who was very active in the creation of sea charts at the beginning of the 19th Century.

The chart is quite rare on the market. We find no examples of the chart offered in dealer catalogs or auction records. The chart was purchased privately as part of a group of similarly folded loose blue backed sea charts.