This is a scan of the map! Beware, it is very large (4200x3000 pixels).
It looked like an Ortelius map and was similar to maps of about 1600 in style and content. An Internet search under "Orbis Terrae Compendiosa Descriptio" yielded quite a few results, from many different cartographers (Mercator, Orletius, Goos, etc...) but no match. I added "Urient" (which I thought to be the name of the maker) to the seach and still no luck. A month later I went through this again and spotted the name "Vrient". Of course I knew the old Romans and the classics couldn't figure the difference between a U and a V. Anyway, I had a name and an image for my map.
This is basic information about this map (mostly from www.maphistory.com and www.swaen.com): Size is 395x573 mm. A very rare large and decorative double hemisphere world map, with the name of Joan Baptistum Vrients. A close copy of Plancius' 1594 world map. The map is engraved by Arnoldus and Henricus Florentinus van Langren to be used for the first edition of Linschoten's Itinerario published by Cornelis Claesz. This much rarer edition differences from the Plancius edition in the northern seas. The pictorial scenes forming the outer border have been regrouped with even greater stylistic effect. This map appears very similar to the earlier prototype - the first world map to incorporate detailed decorative vignettes to represent the four continents - but Shirley notes "the pictorial scenes forming the outer border have been regrouped with even greater stylistic effect ... The overall engraving is even finer than that of the earlier map ...". At the centre, above and below the spheres are celestial charts of each hemisphere, while along each upper and lower border are scenes with animals, habitations, landscapes and elegant female figures depicting each continent. Below the double hemispheres Mexicana and Peruvana have been combined to form a single America, and the fictional Magellanica omitted in favor of a full-panel Africa. The overall engraving is much finer that that of the map engraved by Jan van Doetecum. Linschoten had been in Portuguese service in the East Indies for nearly ten years. This map is considered rare, and an uncolored version of it was recently sold for over $20,000.
Is the map 400 years old or not? Is it valuable? Pros: It looks old, it is faded, it is the right size, it has some very old folds in it and I could find any shop or site selling copies. Cons: too cheap, its glued to a board, and most of all it has small, white marks (easily visible in the scan) where the broken glass rubbed and scratched the surface of the map. If it were really old, wouldn't the paper parchment be brownish under the paper surface? I don't know. Any way, if real, and considering the bad state of the piece and the darn glue, it may be worth something, probably more than I paid for it. If not real, I had fun and have a great scan of a typical 1600s map, with lots of facinating details.
Notice the mythical Island of Brazil near the Irish coast. Consider how much mankind had learned in just the 100 years between this map and Columbus. It is really incredible that Mapmakers (and the men that sailed the uncharted seas) were able to gather so much information in this short time. By 1600, for the first time, maps and globes are beginning to resemble reality. Of course, there were gaps and distortions, and Australia was pretty much unknown, but in general terms men had for the first time an idea of the size and shape of their planet. It was a wonderful age of discovery, and for another 200 years, mapmaking would be one of the most exciting games in town. The problem was the struggle between those who wanted to keep secrets -- trade routes, winds and currents, areas rich in resources (mostly Spanish and Portuguese) -- and those who were dedicated to producing the best and most accurate maps (mostly Dutch, but also English, French, and Germans). As ships arrived from the far corners of the earth, mapmakers would beg, borrow and steal information, captains were interrogated, ships's journals were copied and analyzed, details were checked and rechecked, conflicting reports were evaluated and reconciled. Out of this came the great maps of the 1600s, each a powerful mix of geography, history, art, science and personal bias. Mapmakers traded information and copied from each other. Some, when details were lacking, invented new lands. Others, more prudent, left areas blank or filled them with classical imagery or textual information. Maps were not just charts of land and seas, they included figures representing people and animals in all corners of the earth. A map such as this is not just a map, it is an attempt to educate the public about the world, its people and creatures, in both time and space.
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Page updated: June 2004