Pick of the week
A pre-press version of a key map of colonial America emerged for sale at Swann Auction Galleries in New York on June 6. Carrying an estimate of $30,000-50,000, it sold at $100,000/£76,900 (plus 25% buyer’s premium) – a sum that reflected its extraordinary provenance.
Drawn up by the Welsh surveyor Lewis Evans, A General Map of the Middle British Colonies in America published in 1755, set the standard for mapmaking in this region for half a century. Vast tracts of land were covered including, for the first time, those beyond the British frontier into the Ohio territory.