From the Edward Luther Stevenson Collection.

A fine early photographic facsimile of the Cantino planisphere, one of the most important early world maps to show discoveries in the Americas.

This planisphere is the earliest surviving map showing Portuguese geographical discoveries in the east and west, and is particularly noteworthy for portraying a fragmentary record of the Brazilian coast, explored by Portuguese explorer Pedro Álvares Cabral in 1500, and for depicting with remarkable accuracy and detail the African coast of the Atlantic and Indian Oceans.

The Edward Luther Stevenson Collection

Edward Luther Stevenson was among the most important scholars of early cartography active at the end of the 19th century and the first half of the 20th. He was responsible for numerous cartobibliographic books, including the first translation of Ptolemy to English, as well as a series of impressive facsimile maps produced while he was at the Hispanic Society of New York. Dr. Stevenson viewed facsimiles as integral to the study of early cartography, and he committed himself to building an unparalleled collection of photographs of early maps and globes. Much of his collection was donated to Yale University after his death (click on the title link above for about that), but the present item comes from a large collection of photos, manuscripts, and related material that were part of Stevenson's library, but were not donated to Yale. It is truly an impressive collection and many of the items, though reproductions, have serious antiquarian merit. As Alexander O. Vietor said about Stevenson collection that went to Yale "this is the stuff of which great libraries are made."