Old Map of Dorset in 1844 by Samuel Lewis - Dorchester, Bridport, Lyme Regis

This map of Dorset was engraved in 1844 to accompany Samuel Lewis's Topographical Dictionary of England, a reference work that aimed to record every county, parish and market town in the country in detail. Lewis's London publishing house issued a matching set of county maps so that readers could locate the places described in the text, and this sheet shows Dorset just three years before the Great Western Railway reached Dorchester in 1847, at a point when the county's towns were still linked chiefly by turnpike road and waterway rather than rail.

Dorchester, the county town with origins reaching back to Roman Britain, sits at the centre of the sheet, not far from Sherborne, long an important ecclesiastical centre around its abbey. Bridport appears to the west, its economy built for centuries on the rope and net-making trade, while Lyme Regis, on the county's fossil-rich coastline and later associated with the novelist Jane Austen, marks the south-western corner of the map. Blandford Forum, Shaftesbury and Wimborne Minster are shown among the county's other market towns, and the map traces the River Frome and River Stour as they wind through the Blackmore Vale. The small town of Tolpuddle, sitting quietly among these larger settlements, would within a decade become known across the country as the home of the Tolpuddle Martyrs, whose 1834 trial became a landmark moment in the history of labour rights.

This map suits anyone planning a retirement move to the Dorset coast around Lyme Regis or Bridport, or a family with roots in Dorchester, Sherborne or one of the county's smaller market towns. It would also make a fitting gift to mark a Blackmore Vale wedding or a Wimborne Minster anniversary. Sold unframed and offered in a full range of sizes, it can be scaled from a compact print to a larger piece for a hallway or living room.