North India: Including the Presidency Bengal / Southern India: Including the Presidency of Bombay & Madras [Set of 2]
a) John Rapkin after John Tallis
North India: Including the Presidency Bengal
Steel engraving with original hand-coloured outlines
Circa 1850s
Sheet sizes: approx. 10.5 x 13.75 in (26.5 x 35 cm)
Plate sizes: approx. 10 x 12.25 in (25 x 31 cm)
A highly decorative hand-coloured and detailed mid-19th-century map of Northern India, which was drawn and engraved by J Rapkin (vignettes by A H Wray & J H Kernot) and published in John Tallis's Illustrated Atlas (London & New York: John Tallis & Co., Circa 1850s).
The Illustrated Atlas, published from 1849 to 1853, was the last decorative world atlas. The Northern India map was typical of the many fine ones that appeared in this work with its decorative border and attractive vignettes. Illustrated are views of the British Residency in Hyderabad, the ruins of Old Delhi, a “Car of Juggernaut”, a tiger hunt, and “Hindoos” (an Indian man and woman).
b) John Rapkin after John Tallis
Southern India: Including the Presidency of Bombay & Madras
Steel engraving with original hand-coloured outlines
Circa 1850s
Sheet sizes: approx. 14.5 x 10.5 in (37 x 27 cm)
Plate sizes: approx. 13 x 9 in (33.5 x 23 cm)
Gorgeous full later hand-coloured example of this decorative map of South India engraved by J. Rapkin (vignettes by A. H. Wray & J H Kernot) and published in John Tallis's Illustrated Atlas (London & New York: John Tallis & Co., Circa 1850s). With six engraved vignettes, including a view of the fortress at Jaipur, the Government House, Calcutta, and the tomb of Sultan Mahomed Shah, Bejapoor.
India Divided: Northern & Southern India — A Matched Pair of Decorative Mid-19th-Century Atlas Maps
This finely matched pair of mid-nineteenth-century atlas maps presents Northern and Southern India as conceived during the mature phase of East India Company administration. Executed in steel engraving and issued with delicate original hand colouring, the maps combine precise political geography with a richly ornamental visual programme characteristic of high-Victorian commercial cartography.
The subcontinent is divided across two plates for clarity and emphasis: Northern India detailing the Gangetic plain, Punjab, Bengal and adjoining territories, and Southern India encompassing the Deccan, Madras Presidency, Mysore, Travancore, and Ceylon. Railways, rivers, and administrative boundaries are clearly distinguished, reflecting contemporary colonial priorities of governance, infrastructure, and territorial control.
Surrounding each map is an elaborate decorative border populated with engraved vignettes depicting forts, palaces, civic architecture, and regional scenery, framing India not merely as a geographic entity but as an imperial possession rendered legible and picturesque for a metropolitan audience. This fusion of cartographic accuracy and visual spectacle was central to Tallis-era atlases, which were marketed to an educated middle-class readership seeking both instruction and display.
Preserved together, the present pair offers a cohesive and visually compelling representation of British India at mid-century and remains among the most recognisable and desirable illustrated maps of the period.
(Set of two)
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