Ch'onha Chido [Atlas of all under Heaven]

A Scarce Korean Manuscript Atlas.

Rare Korean manuscript atlas with 12 maps, produced around 1800. With a world map (Chonha-Do) with China in the center, a map of China with Korea, a map of the Ryukyu Islands, a map of Japan, and 8 maps of the Korean provinces. The map of China shows the Great Wall of China, the Yellow River (Huang He) and the Yangtze. The manuscript maps are extremely artistically drawn and feature many details.

The world map is folded on all four sides to the format of the atlas, unfolded the sheet has a size of 46 x 41 cm, the diameter of the world map is 35 cm. The maps are bound in a cardboard cover of the period with a title on the front cover.

A Ch'onha chido (Atlas of the World) is a traditional Korean atlas made between the mid-18th century and the beginning of the 19th century. Mostly such an atlas contains manuscript maps, more rarely also woodcut maps. The maps of a Ch'onha chido are based on maps made during the Chinese Ming Dynasty (1368-1644).

Shannon McCune stated about Korean atlases and world maps:

The world map, or Chonha-Do (Under Heaven Map), has had more attention than perhaps it deserves. As Dr. Nakamura pointed out in his article in Imago Mundi (Vol. 4, 1948), the world map was based on antecedents in Buddhist maps. The many exotic place names were derived from Chinese romantic and mythical accounts, particularly from the Chinese classic the Chan-hai-king written in the third century B. C. The world map has China in its center and shows cartographically the dominant position of the Middle Kingdom in the minds of Korean scholars. The Korean scholar, Ch'an Lee, who has written on this world map, notes that such a map is uniquely Korean. Though the world map and the other maps in the Korean atlases were based on ancient sources, they had an amazing popularity and were copied and reproduced in wood-blocks for many centuries during the Yi Dynasty.

Binding rubbed and bumped, spine fragmentarily preserved.

The maps mainly in the margins somewhat browned and stained, partly some minor damage to the edges. Very good condition.

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Atlases - Anonymous - Ch'onha Chido [Atlas of all under Heaven]