Old Map of Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly in 1829 by Greenwood & Co. - Penzance, St Ives, Plymouth, Land's End, Padstow

Christopher Greenwood built his cartographic reputation not by copying earlier surveys but by sending his own teams of surveyors out across England's counties with theodolites and chains, determined to outdo even the government's own mapping efforts. Trading as Greenwood & Co. with his brother and son, he financed each county map through advance subscriptions from local gentry, a slow and expensive process that meant the Cornwall sheet did not reach print until 1829, years after the survey work began. The result was one of the most exhaustively detailed large-scale maps of the county produced before the Ordnance Survey completed its own coverage of the far southwest, recording turnpike roads, parish boundaries, mills, and the seats of local landowners with a precision earlier county maps rarely attempted.

The sheet stretches from the fishing harbours of the far west to the Tamar valley, taking in Penzance and its sheltered bay, the artists' town of St Ives on the north coast, and the dramatic cliffs at Land's End where England runs out into the Atlantic. Padstow appears on its tidal estuary, while Plymouth anchors the eastern edge of the map where Cornwall gives way toward Devon. Truro, already established as the county town, Falmouth with its deep natural harbour, the granite expanse of Bodmin Moor, and the wind-scoured Lizard Peninsula all find their place, alongside the Isles of Scilly plotted off the coast much as sailors of the period would have known them.

For anyone with Cornish roots, this is a map that repays close study, since parish names and hamlets long since absorbed into larger towns can still be picked out along the lanes and coastal paths Greenwood's surveyors walked. Family historians tracing ancestors through the tin-mining villages of the interior, collectors interested in the transition from Georgian to Victorian mapmaking, and anyone who simply loves the Cornish coastline will find plenty to look at here. The print has been reproduced at high resolution from an original sheet, keeping the engraved linework and place-name lettering legible, and it is offered in a range of sizes so it can suit a small study wall or a larger hallway display alike.