Martin Llewellyn's Atlas of the East (c. 1598)
Expanded and amended version of a paper distributed at the Sixth International Conference on the History of Cartography, Greenwich, London, 9 September 1975. Mostly written in 1975; placed on the web 8 May 2006
[illustrations added June 2008; and further additions December 2008-February 2009]

This text was never prepared for publication. A brief article based on the original paper appeared as: 'Atlas Pioneer', Geographical Magazine 48:3 (December 1975) pp.162-7. In addition, a set of print-outs from microfilm of all sixteen sheets is kept in the British Library Map Library (Maps 183.e.2). No further research was carried out since then but occasional pieces of information came to light over the intervening years and are inserted into the text below. A quick check via Google produced a few further pieces of information but there has been no systematic attempt at updating. The list of contemporary maps and charts with which Llewellyn's atlas was compared could certainly be expanded. It was not practicable to include the full place-name analysis here.

However, minor corrections have been made and some material (omitted from the original because of length) has been added. Such sections, and later additions, are indicated by { }. An extended passage has also been introduced from the Geographical Magazine article. The result is an unpolished text designed to set down all that has been discovered to date, with pointers for future research.

Because the atlas and this interpretation were never published - largely the result of an abortive attempt to produce a facsimile with commentary - Llewellyn's atlas has hardly been mentioned in print since 1975. It is hoped that this web-mounting exercise may reverse that neglect.

The 1975 text acknowledged the assistance of the librarian of Christ Church, Dr J.F.A. Mason, and the Archivist of St Bartholomew's Hospital, Dr Nellie J. Kerling. To those should be added thanks for the help on English charting of the period provided by Sarah Tyacke and to Katie Ormerod, Deputy Archivist of St Bartholomew's Hospital, for details about the crucial meeting in August 1597 (2009).

Use may be made of the text, with appropriate acknowledgement please, including the note of its creation date.


Summary
In early 1969, on a visit to Oxford, I decided to call in at Christ Church, Oxford's largest college, in the hope that their library might contain some unusual cartographic material. What I found far exceeded my wildest expectations. Intrigued by an item described in their hand-written catalogue as, 'Maps - 18th century, English and Foreign', I asked to see what proved to be Martin Llewellyn's atlas of the East. It is my contention that this volume, which had lain unknown to map historians for over three and a half centuries, constitutes the earliest sea atlas by an Englishman, so far identified; and that it contains the earliest known English charts of the East. Its printed equivalent, the Oriental volume of the English Pilot, was not to appear for a further century. Indeed, no earlier sea atlas expressly designed for navigation in the East by a chartmaker of any nationality has yet been identified, although Portuguese world atlases would normally include a coverage of the East. It is beyond dispute that his atlas introduces a new and important chartmaker into the ranks of those working in late Elizabethan or early Jacobean England.



Llewellyn's atlas was donated to Christ Church in 1634 {though a former Librarian thought this event might have taken place anywhere in the period 1632-39, in which case Martin Jr's evident arrival in 1636 might be a possible alternative date} . The entry recording this gift states that it was "drawn in [his own] hand and according to his own observations", from which it seems that Llewellyn had himself travelled to the East. It can be shown that he was in one continuous occupation from 1597 until his death in 1634, as Renter, and two years later, Steward, of St Bartholomew's Hospital, London. He could not, therefore, have left England on an extended voyage after 1597. Corroboration that he had indeed drawn the atlas himself comes from the clear evidence of the same hand on some estate plans prepared for the Hospital, for one of which there is a record of payment to him. The investigation which this paper describes has uncovered the fact that the first Dutch voyage to the East (1595-7), under Cornelis de Houtman, led to the introduction of an entirely new range of names for the East Indies, and particularly for Java. The 32 names added to its north coast include today's capital, Jakarta and Surabaja, now the second- largest city. The source for these can be identified with confidence as Pedro de Tayda, a local Portugese pilot living in Bantam. De Tayda was able, in the course of the three weeks between the arrival of the Dutch and his own murder as a consequence of that contact, to pass on his cartographic knowledge of the East Indies. Llewellyn's atlas includes many of what can be recognised for the first time as place-names deriving from de Tayda.

Only the voyage undertaken by Houtman could have been completed by the time Llewellyn took up his stewardship and, simultaneously, have provided his Java toponymy. The likelihood is that he himself was one of the eighty-nine survivors of that expedition (in which case, as a foreigner, he might well have disguised his name) and that his atlas represents knowledge of the period immediately prior to the foundation of the East India Company in 1600 and of the Dutch equivalent (VOC) in 1602. Among leads suggested for possible future research are the connections between the chronically debt-ridden Llewellyn and various wealthy and influential individuals, including some (his brother among them) involved with the earliest history of the East India Company.