Significant map of North America with an early iteration of the Louisiana Purchase.

This map of North America by the English map maker, Robert Wilkinson was first issued in 1794 but regularly updated into the early 19th century. As with earlier issues, Wilkinson colour codes the geo-political aspects of the map; on this occasion, the United States is green, the English possession are pink and Spanish dominions are yellow.

Comparatively to the 1794 example of this map, Wilkinson has added far greater detail, particularly to the west; there are multiple Native American tribes named, several attempts to show the tributaries to the Mississippi and Canada shows much of the detail originally presented by the cartography of the Hudson’s Bay Company.

Of particular interest is the small chart on the lower left which lists the possessions of each of the powers in North America. A small note at the bottom of the United States acknowledges the cession of Louisiana to the United States by France in 1803. This is further emphasized by establishing the western border of the United States a short distance west of the Mississippi. Previous to this, maps used the river as the western border of the country.

The original wording of the Louisiana Purchase was the areas encompassing the drainage basin of the Mississippi River and that is what this map is showing. It is a very early illustration of this new geo-political phenomenon and it is sourced from Wilkinson extremely rare larger format map of the United States published in 1804 which is the first map to illustrate the Louisiana Purchase.

Original colour. [AMER2391]