Spain & Portugal Map 1856 Gibraltar Inset Print - Madrid, Lisbon, Barcelona, Gibraltar, Palma

George W. Colton drew this Spain and Portugal for Colton's Atlas of the World, published by J.H. Colton and Company in New York in 1856. The catalog calls the one-volume edition scarcer than the two-volume one and notes that it was Colton's first world atlas, after many years of pocket maps, wall maps and guides. The map is a colored lithograph at 1:3,294,720, measuring 41 by 33 centimeters, in full color by region, with the Balearic Islands included and an inset of Gibraltar. An ornate decorative border surrounds the sheet, a hallmark of Colton's maps. The atlas, which the catalog describes as one of the finest and most accurate of its period, ran for over thirty years.

In 1856 Isabella II reigned in Spain, with Madrid as the capital, and Portugal was ruled by Pedro V, a young king whose regency had ended in 1855, while Lisbon's first railway opened that October. The Gibraltar inset gives the Rock, which Britain had held since 1713, an enlarged view of its own, and the catalog calls the place strategically important in British-Spanish relations. Barcelona, the Catalan industrial city, and Palma, on the Balearic island of Mallorca, were the main Mediterranean centers of the east. The color by region marked each province clearly, which suited a period when nation-states were defining their territory.

A traveler who has stood at Gibraltar, a collector of American atlas cartography, or a family with roots in the Balearic Islands will find a distinguished gift here. TheMapVault's Johnson sheet of 1860 also carries a Gibraltar inset, since Johnson and Browning succeeded J.H. Colton and Company, whereas this Colton sheet of 1856 comes from his first world atlas, with an ornate border of its own. Like every print in the collection, it ships unframed and is available in a full range of sizes, from a compact desk piece to a large-format statement print.