Nova Virginiae Tabula

Jacob Meurs prepared Nova Virginiae Tabula for publication in the Dutch edition of Montanus’s Die Unbekante Neue Welt, the first encyclopedia of the Americas. It is a derivative of the John Smith map of Virginia. The pictorial representations of the Indian chief Powhatan and the Susquehanna brave depicted on the original Smith map have been replaced on this version with an attractive cartouche featuring two Indians admiring a llama, a goat and a unicorn – animals thought by some Europeans to be native to Virginia.