4 
H. Gr. FORDHAM-HERTFORDSHIRE MAPS. 
John Speed’s county maps in his ‘ Theatre of the Empire of 
Great Britaine’ (1611, etc.) are nearly all of them signed by 
Jodocus Hondius and dated 1610, hut these maps, like those of 
Saxton, were some of them engraved and published individually 
at earlier dates than that attributable to the collection as a whole, 
the earliest being apparently Oxfordshire, 1605. Some of them 
are said to have been engraved by Abraham GoosA 
The reprints, which are numerous and extend over more than 
a century in time, always retain the original engraver’s name, and 
very often the original date, which is somewhat deceptive. 
The different editions may be distinguished by the state of the 
impression, alterations and additions in the design itself, alterations 
in the publisher’s imprint, and, as a last resource, by comparison 
of the text on the back, which differs in type and ornamentation 
in the various issues.f Speed, in addition to his great works, 
‘ The Theatre of the Empire of Great Britaine ’ and the ‘ History 
of Great Britaine,’ which were at first issued as one thick folio 
volume, but afterwards appeared separately, published an Epitome, 
or Abridgment, with Peter Keer’s maps of 1599 (with English 
titles substituted on the plates for the original Latin, but otherwise 
unaltered) in small oblong 12mo, of which there were editions in 
1620 (?), 1627, 1666, and 1676. 
During the same period were appearing a set of curious little 
thin quarto books, consisting of engraved plates containiug 
distance tables for the use of travellers, and minute skeleton 
maps of each county. The tables are copied from those in 
Korden’s work of 1625. J In Norden’s preface he says of the 
tables of distances : “ It is a new invention .... But for 
want of perticall dimensuration, I have been enforced, to borrow 
the helpe, as well of mine owne Maps which I have made, by 
travaile of divers Shires: now totally finished by the laborious 
travailes of Mr. Speede, whose Maps together with Mr. Saxtons 
and mine owne, have been the principall direction in this tedious 
worke.” 
The first of these little books consists of a set of engraved 
plates four inches square, by Jacob van Langeren, dated 1635. 
The frontispiece is a circular map of England and Wales, which 
has been reproduced as the frontispiece of this Catalogue. As 
appears by the Latin inscription in the margin, it shows the 
counties and principal towns, and the number of the parishes in 
each county. It is engraved by William Kip. A second edition 
* Gough’s ‘Anecdotes of British Topography’ (1768), p. 42, note. 
t The initial letter H, ante p. 1, is a facsimile of that on the hack of the 
map of Herts in the first edition of the ‘Theatre ’ (1611), with a figure of 
St. Nicholas, the patron Saint of travellers, which is frequently made use of in 
initial letters in topographical books of this period. 
X ‘ England An Intended Guyde, For English Travailers. Shewing in 
generall, how far one Citie, and many Shire-Townes in England, are distant from 
other. Together, with the Shires in particular : and the Cheife Townes in every 
of them. With a generall Table, of the most of the principall Townes in 
Wales.’ Invented and Collected, By John Norden. Voluntas pro facilitate . 
