- Title: Amplissima Regionis Mississipi Seu Provinciæ Ludovicianæ
- Author: Johann Baptiste Homann
- Date: 1720
- Medium: Hand-colored copperplate engraving
- Condition: Very Good - full margined example, contemporary wash color, age toned, mild dust soiling, visible center crease
- Inches: 19 3/4 x 22 1/2 [Image]
- Centimeters: 50.17 x 57.15 [Image]
- Product ID: 315095
Amplissima Regionis Mississipi seu Provinciæ Ludoviciannæ â R. P. Ludovico Hennepin Francise Miss. in America Septentrionali Anno 1687 detectae. nunc Gallorum Coloniis et Actionum Negotiis toto Orbe celeberrimæ. Nova Tabula edita â Io. Bapt. Homanno S. C. M. Geographo Norimbergæ. Cum Privilegio Sac. Cæs. Maj.
"The large countries of Mississippi or the Ludovician Provinces detected in North America the year 1687 by Robert A. Lewis Hennepin of France, Missionary. Now all affairs and actions of the colonies of the Gauls are very populous over all the world. New map edited by Johann Baptiste Homann, S. C. M. Geographer of Nuremberg. With Privilege of His Sacred Cæsar Majesty"
A significant map of the New World dating from the early-to-mid-eighteenth century. Extends from the Mississippi basin to the East Coast including the Great Lakes and eastern Canada. Piece depicts the contemporary European understanding of what is today Texas, New Mexico, the Gulf Coast, and Florida, and provides a good detail of the Rio Grande and the Mississippi River Valley, labeling the locations of Indian tribes and French forts on the Missouri and Ohio Rivers (including Fort St. Louis). Native American tribes identified include the Sioux, the Miamis, the Iroquois, the Conchatez, the Cheraqui, and the Quicapou. Most of the land shown, at the time under French control, is titled La Louisiane. Homann's map was based largely on LaSalle's explorations, but gives credit to the Recollect Louis Hennepin (1640-1701). Hennepin explored the upper Mississippi until he was captured and lived among the Sioux. He was first to describe Niagara Falls; a vignette view below the title cartouche shows the falls and a beaver colony.
This map is called the Buffalo Map due to its lower-right cartouche featuring a view of a bison with an Indian family. Most sources date this map to 1720, but historian Carl Irving Wheat (1892-1966, author of Mapping the Transmississippi West, 1540-1861) gives the date as circa 1763.