Antique map - 17th-century Chinese world map
Poster sold unframed but easy to frame!
This poster is sold rolled up inside a rigid protective tube. Our sizes are standard and you will easily find a frame or poster hanger (magnetic poster holder) to suit your taste!
Description
This globe is a fascinating piece that illustrates the cultural and scientific encounter between the East and the West. 🌍
⛩️ Although its style and annotations are Chinese, it is directly inspired by the work of the Italian Jesuit missionary Matteo Ricci, who was the first to introduce modern European cartography to China at the end of the sixteenth century.
This map is a later version, probably from the eighteenth century, derived from the famous Kunyu Wanguo Quantu, which means "the map of the ten thousand countries of the world".
🏯 Matteo Ricci's original was created at the request of Emperor Wanli to show the imperial court that China was only part of a much larger world.
On this planisphere, we observe an ingenious adaptation: so as not to offend the sensibilities of the Middle Kingdom, which considered itself the center of the world, Ricci placed China at the center of the map, thus shifting Europe to the edges. This is a layout that, moreover, has remained the standard for many maps produced in Asia to this day.
The geographical outline reveals the knowledge of the time with astonishing precision for some continents and poetic approximations for others. We can clearly distinguish the outlines of Africa, Europe, and Asia, while the Americas and the southern land are represented in a more speculative manner.
The annotations in Chinese characters do not merely name places, they sometimes describe the customs of the inhabitants or natural curiosities, thus mixing rigorous geography and fantastic travelogues.
On a technical level, this version uses an oval projection that was very popular in European atlases of the Renaissance. The delicate colors and the use of ink recall the codes of traditional Chinese painting, making this document a hybrid object. 🖌️
It was not used solely for navigation, but above all as a diplomatic and educational tool for Chinese scholars, allowing them to grasp the overall shape of the Earth while retaining their own cosmology.
Today, it remains a precious testimony of the way ideas circulate and transform from one end of the planet to the other.
Creative paper
For vintage paper posters, we use a natural-toned and textured, slightly grained, 200 gsm FSC®-certified fine art paper. We chose this paper for its durability and to preserve its vintage look: it is an uncoated paper, so the colors will have an "aged" appearance that stays true to the spirit of the original card.
If you would like to get an idea of how the printed result will look, which is always different from what you see on screen, please contact us and we will be happy to help! Rest assured that we will do our utmost to respond to your request as quickly as possible!
Shipping costs
For shipping, we use Colissimo by La Poste.
You can choose your Colissimo pickup point after paying for your order (you have 10 business days to collect your order).
We recommend choosing delivery to a pickup point, as you can select the one that suits you, to avoid being delivered to a pickup point you cannot choose if you are not home for a home delivery with Colissimo.
- Mainland France : €6 to a pickup point, €8 for home delivery without signature, €9 for home delivery with signature, free delivery to a pickup point on orders over €60
- Europe (Austria, Belgium, Germany, Denmark, Finland, Ireland, Italy, Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland): €12, free delivery on orders over €100
- United Kingdom: €18, free delivery on orders over €120
Manufacturing and delivery
For paper posters : we print to order in our workshop in Bordeaux.
- We prepare orders within 24 to 48 hours (Monday to Friday) after receipt of payment and hand over the packages on day 2/3. Colissimo then delivers within 3 to 4 days.
- If your order contains several posters, they will be shipped in a single shipping tube.
If you wish to receive your posters in separate tubes, you will need to place as many orders as desired tubes.
- Please allow a total delivery time of 5 to 7 business days to receive your order (excluding holiday periods or exceptional circumstances).
- For urgent orders, you can call us at 05 56 02 03 20 or write to us at bonjour@cartopolo.fr
For complaints related to delivery, you have a maximum of 7 days from the receipt of the package, dated by the delivery notice, to send them to us. Sending photos of the packaging, the shipping label attached to the packaging, as well as the product will facilitate the processing of your request.
Satisfied or your money back!
Not satisfied or have you changed your mind? You have 14 days from the date of receipt to return your order to us.
Once the returned product has been received by Cartopolo in perfect condition in its unopened original packaging, the refund will be issued to the credit card used for the purchase within 30 days.
Returns are only accepted for standard products from our online catalog. Any order that has been customized cannot be returned or refunded.
If you have any doubts or questions about a product before purchasing it, we recommend contacting us via our contact form or by phone. We will do our utmost to respond as quickly as possible!