Atlas Maior

Earlier, much smaller versions, titled Theatrum Orbis Terrarum, sive, Atlas Novus, were published from 1634 onwards.

Like Abraham Ortelius's Theatrum Orbis Terrarum (1570), the Atlas Maior is widely considered a masterpiece of the Golden Age of Dutch/Netherlandish cartography (approximately 1570s–1670s).

[note 1] Somewhere around 1604 Willem Blaeu settled down in Amsterdam and opened a shop on the Damrak, where he produced and sold scientific instruments, globes and maps.

Willem and his son Joan Blaeu made a public announcement in an Amsterdam newspaper that they would publish their own full atlas in 1634.

The final version of the atlas was published as the Atlas Maior and contained 594 maps in eleven (Latin edition: Geographia qvæ est cosmographiæ Blavianæ), twelve (French edition: Le grand atlas ou Cosmographie blaviane, en laquelle est exactement descritte la terre, la mer et le ciel), nine (Dutch edition: Grooten atlas, oft werelt-beschryving, in welcke 't aertryck, de zee en hemel wordt vertoont en beschreven) or ten (German edition) volumes.

Atlas Blaeu - Erfgoed Leiden en Omstreken
Front page of the Atlas novus , forerunner of the Atlas maior , 1645
Joan & Willem Blaeu Atlas in 11 volumes with white leather binding with gold leaf and special chest to hold it in, next to a portrait of Willem Blaeu, copy in the University of Amsterdam Special Collections