- Title: Iedo
- Author: Jacob van Meurs
- Date: c. 1670
- Condition: Very Good - age toning, issued folding, light foxing/ discoloration
- Inches: 30 7/8 x 12 1/4 [Paper]
- Centimeters: 78.42 x 31.12 [Paper]
- Product ID: 101550
Seventeenth-century view of Edo (now Tokyo), Japan by Dutch engraver Jacob van Meurs. Includes numbered legends in both English and Dutch indicating major buildings and landmarks of the region. During the Meiji Restoration of 1868, the Japanese government renamed the city of Edo as Tokyo ("Eastern Capital"). The Restoration, a period of innovation and advancement within Japan, was undertaken to keep Japanese society, culture, and commerce in step with that of Western powers.
Background on Creator
Jacob van Meurs (c. 1619–c. 1680) was a Dutch engraver and publisher based in Amsterdam, active from the early 1650s through about 1680. He specialized in large, heavily illustrated folio volumes on geography, travel, and history, collaborating with leading authors to issue ambitious works such as the first edition of The New and Unknown World: or Description of America and the Southland, notable for its extensive series of copperplate views and maps. His workshop supplied engraved plates that circulated widely in seventeenth-century Europe, and examples of his work are now held in major institutions including the National Gallery of Art, the National Portrait Gallery, and the British Museum.