Books

4to, 1 leaf, pp. 64, (26), and 27 folding engraved maps. Contemporary calf, neatly rebacked and corners repaired (sides rubbed, margins of first and last few leaves stained from the binding). Early signature of Thomas Stone of Oxford on front pastedown; also later signature of F.W.L. Thomas; bookplate of T.N. Brushfield on rear pastedown. Provincial English printing of ?the first extant geographical work in Latin and the only Roman treatise of the classical period devoted exclusively to that subject? (DSB). In this edition, printed in Exeter, each map bears the arms of the person to whom it is dedicated. These are chiefly members of Devonshire families, such as Chudleigh, Sydenham, Musgrave, Carew, etc. Pomponius Mela (fl. 44 AD) was a Roman from southern Spain, near Gibraltar. His geography, known as De chorographia or De Situ Orbis, was his only work. ?An elegant and carefully edited edition? (Lowndes).

De situ orbis is an early geographical work by Pomponius Mela, providing detailed descriptions of the world as known to the Romans in the 1st century AD.