This lot includes two disbound sections of Van der Aa's extensive exploration volumes focused on the West Indies, Mexico and Central America. Section #3 contains one map and 3 plates and section #6 contains one plate.

The finely engraved map covers the Gulf of Mexico and the West Indies into northern South America locating Terra Firma. Florida is shown with the southern and east coast lined with numerous small islands. The pictorial cartouche shows a large group of Spanish colonists gathered around an executioner and a condemned prisoner. Fancy compass rose with fleur-de-lys in the Gulf of Mexico. This map depicts the region explored by Francisco Hernández de Córdoba.

The plates depict a beheading, the burning of the dead, disemboweled men, and men cutting and hauling rocks along a shoreline. Section #3 has 80 pp. and is missing pages 81-94 and the Register. Section #6 has 18 pp.

References:

Condition: B+

The map is a dark impression with light toning and offsetting, and is no longer bound with the text. The text and plates have light toning and minor soiling.