Chapter Eleven. The Impact Of The De Bry Collection: Travel Literature And Travel Compendia In The Seventeenth Century

Abstract

In the absence of marginal notes or other annotations made by readers of the De Bry collection, it is virtually impossible to establish the influence its representations exerted on individuals. An analysis of those who purchased the collection in the first half of the seventeenth century can only partly make up for that deficit. The family made several efforts to reach beyond the customary elites who could be counted on to buy the folio volumes, in an attempt to further disseminate their representations, and to sell yet more books. The De Bry representations also influenced other travel literature, and tracking these infiltrations can help to build a more complete picture of the collection?s impact. This chapter discusses the publications, mostly but not exclusively geographical and cartographical works, which drew on the De Bry collection for some of the representations they distributed.Keywords: cartographical works; De Bry collection; seventeenth century; travel literature