2 
H. G. FORD HAM-HERTFORD SHIRE MAPS. 
at this period. Most of these works had their origin in the Low 
Countries, where an important school of map-engravers and map- 
makers had grown up. 
Of this school Gerhard Kramer, commonly known as Mercator 
(1512-1594), who first used the title ‘Atlas’ for a collection 
of maps, is esteemed as the founder of modern cartography; * 
and Abraham Ortelius of Antwerp (1527-1598), Jodocus Hondius 
of Amsterdam (1563-1611), and Henricus Hondius, his son, 
William Janszoon Blaeu (1571-1638),f and his two sons Jan Blaeu 
and Cornelis Blaeu, and Jan Janszoon of Antwerp, were well 
known and prolific in their work. Peter Keer also engraved 
a great many maps, although he was, apparently, not himself 
a publisher. Wenceslaus Hollar (1607-1677), a native of Bohemia, 
who settled in London, and engraved a vast number of portraits, 
views, plans, and maps, belongs to this period, although his maps 
were mostly published towards the end of the seventeenth century. 
But native topographers and engravers were not wanting in the 
British Isles. The first modern map of England and Wales was 
the work of a Welshman, Humphrey Lhuyd of Denbighshire, 
and was published in 1569. A few years later Christopher Saxton 
brought out the first set of maps of the Counties of England and 
Wales, 35 in number. The surveying for and the draughting 
of these maps, which Saxton undertook and carried through 
successfully, must be esteemed a highly meritorious work, 
especially when one considers the means at his disposal ; and 
for a century at least our county maps, whether engraved in 
England or on the Continent, are either copied from or almost 
entirely based upon his designs. Saxton’s maps are now very 
rare in their original state and edition. They were published 
as a complete collection in 1579, the date on the engraved title- 
page, but the surveying and the publication of individual maps 
had then been going on for several years, some of the maps 
appearing as early as 1574 (Oxfordshire, Buckinghamshire, and 
Berkshire in one map, and Norfolk). Kent, Hampshire, Dorset¬ 
shire, Somersetshire, Devonshire, and Suffolk are dated 1575, and 
the remainder 1576, 1577, and 1578. Hertfordshire is of the 
year 1577, and is engraved by Nicholas Beynolds of London. 
This is the only map of Saxton’s upon which Reynolds’ name 
appears. Augustine Ryther, described as Anglus, engraved the 
frontispiece map of England, and also the maps of Gloucestershire, 
Yorkshire, Durham, and Westmorland. { Some of the maps are 
unsigned, others were the work of Remigius Hogenhergius, § 
Lenaert Terwoort of Antwerp, and other foreign artists. 
* Ortelius calls him “ nostri sceculi Ptolemceus.” 
f William Blaeu was in 1633 appointed by public decree cartographer to the 
States-General; and it was his duty to examine the ships’ logs and so amend 
the maps. 
% Eyther, according to a note in the ‘Typographical Antiquities,’ Ames & 
Herbert, London, 1790, 3 vols., 4to (vol. iii, p. 1652), kept a shop a little way 
from Leadenhall, near the sign of the Tower. 
§ Hogenhergius had settled in England, it seems. 
