About this sheet
This antique cattle plague map of Europe traces the successive invasions of rinderpest from 1711 to 1871, engraved by E. Morieu for M. Reynal and included in the French agricultural album for the Vienna Exposition, 1873. The map runs from the Atlantic to the Urals, with the invasions traced in colored lines and dated in the key: 1711, 1740, 1756, 1775, 1815, 1865, 1866, 1867 and 1870 to 1871. Railways, cattle droving routes, quarantine stations and cattle markets are all marked.
It was engraved by E. Morieu for Reynal's Traite de la Police sanitaire des animaux domestiques, published by P. Asselin, and lithographed by Becquet. Disease maps of this date are uncommon, and this one belongs with the small group of nineteenth century epidemic maps collected as ancestors of modern epidemiology.
The sheet comes from the folio of maps, plans and drawings that the Direction de l'Agriculture of the French Ministry of Agriculture and Commerce assembled for its own exhibit at the Exposition Universelle held in Vienna in 1873, printed in Paris by the Imprimerie Nationale. The album gathered the statistical cartography, the model state farms, the breed portraits and the prize silver by which France meant to present its agriculture to the world. Its thematic maps belong to the first generation of printed statistical mapping, a field now collected for the history of data visualization quite as much as for the history of farming.
The map is cataloged as a steel engraving with printed color; its credits name both an engraver and a lithographer. The color is printed rather than applied by hand. As a piece of early statistical cartography, this antique cattle plague map suits a study, library, office or country kitchen, and it can be framed on its own or hung as a group with other maps from the album.
The sheet is in good condition, with light age toning, scattered foxing and visible horizontal and vertical fold lines. There is minor edge wear, with some marginal marks. The toning is the ordinary result of age rather than damage. Please see the images for a full view of the condition.
This is an original antique map, not a modern reproduction. This item is sold unframed. Any framed or interior images are shown for presentation and inspiration only, unless the listing explicitly states that the item is sold framed.
