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Purchas’ famous compilation of travels contains the first English-text map of China to be published, with a description of its origins:

The originall map, whence this present was taken and contracted, was by Captaine Saris ... gotten at Bantam of a Chinese... So here we give you a true China, the Chinois themselves being our Guides and the Jesuites their both Examiners and Interpreters.

In 1620, Purchas acquired the papers of the geographer, Richard Hakluyt (1552-1616), including this map given to Hakluyt by Captain Saris six years earlier. The original map is thought to have dated from 1593 and was copied from an original Chinese administrative map, which is now lost.

Citation:
2. Samuel Purchas, Purchas his pilgrimes ... The third part (London,1625),
Marsh's Library Exhibits,
accessed May 16, 2025,
https://web.marshlibrary.ie/digi/items/show/560