Freti Magellanici ac novi Freti vulgo Le Maire exactissima delineatio

Abstract

Old color example of Hondius' map of the Straits of Magellan, Le Mair Strait, Fire Lands and the the southern tip of Patagonia.

The coastlines of Tierra del Fuego are incomplete. Fully engraved to show the mountainous terrain with no other detail, except a depiction of penguins, noted as Pingini Aves. Richly arrayed with rhumb lines, a compass rose, galleons and sea monsters in addition to the three strapwork cartouches.

Henricus Hondius (1597-1651) was a Dutch engraver and mapmaker, a member of a prominent cartographic family. His father, Jodocus Hondius, was also an engraver and geographer. While working with his father, Henricus was instrumental in the expansion and republishing of Mercator’s atlas, first published in 1595 and republished by Hondius in 1606.

Upon his father’s death in 1612, Henricus and his brother, Jodocus the Younger, took over the business. He set up his own shop in 1621, where he continued to release new editions of the Mercator atlas. Later, he partnered with his brother-in-law, Jan Janssonius, in continuing to expand and publish Mercator’s atlas, which would become known as the Mercator-Hondius-Janssonius atlas. Born and based in Amsterdam, he died there in 1651.