Puteoli, Aspectus proeclarus

Title

Puteoli, Aspectus proeclarus

Description

Map shows the city of Puzzuoli at the Golf of Naples.

ca. 1729

Artist

Aa, van der (1659-1733)

Pieter van der Aa ( 1659 - 1733) was a Dutch publisher best known for preparing maps and atlases, though he also printed pirated editions of foreign bestsellers and illustrated volumes. He also printed many maps that were often out of print, which he reissued. Some of his most popular maps were of the African continent, detailing locations such as Morocco and Madagascar. Many of his later works were printed for the general public in French and Dutch. Pieter van der Aa began his career at Leiden in 1683 as a Latin trade publisher, publishing classical texts pertaining to medicine and science. As he progressed, he began to publish atlases and maps, compiling numerous multi-volume collections of works. His ambition to become Leiden's most famous printer was fulfilled in 1715 with his appointment to head printer for the city and its university. One of Pieter van der Aa's largest compilations relates to the history of Italy and Sicily, an area of immense personal interest. Though he took credit for many of his compilations, several, such as the Dutch collection of travels to the East and West Indies, were admittedly simple improvements to others' works.

Historical Description

Southern Italy consists of today's Italian regions that belonged to the Kingdom of Sicily before the unification of Italy in 1861. These are the regions of Abruzzo, Molise, Campania, Basilicata, Apulia, Calabria and Sicily. The Romans used to call the area of Sicily and coastal Southern Italy Magna Graecia ("Great Greece"), since it was so densely inhabited by the Greeks; the ancient geographers differed on whether the term included Sicily or merely Apulia and Calabria—Strabo being the most prominent advocate of the wider definitions. With this colonisation, Greek culture was exported to Italy, in its dialects of the Ancient Greek language, its religious rites and its traditions of the independent polis. An original Hellenic civilization soon developed, later interacting with the native Italic and Latin civilisations. The most important cultural transplant was the Chalcidean/Cumaean variety of the Greek alphabet, which was adopted by the Etruscans; the Old Italic alphabet subsequently evolved into the Latin alphabet, which became the most widely used alphabet in the world. In 1442 Alfonso V conquered the Kingdom of Naples and united Sicily and Naples as dependencies of the Crown of Aragon. When he died in 1458, the kingdom was again separated and Naples was inherited by Ferrante, Alfonso's illegitimate son. When Ferrante died in 1494, Charles VIII invaded Italy from France and used Angevin's claim to the throne of Naples, inherited by his father in 1481 after the death of King René's nephew, as an excuse to start the Italian wars. A point of contention between France and Spain for the next several decades, but French efforts to gain control of it weakened over the decades and Spanish control was never really compromised. The French finally gave up their claims to the kingdom through the Treaty of Cateau-Cambrésis in 1559. With the Treaty of London (1557) the new client state of the so-called Presidi ("State of Garrisons") was founded and directly ruled by Spain as part of the Kingdom of Naples. After the War of the Spanish Succession in the early 18th century, possession of the kingdom again changed hands. Under the terms of the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713, Naples was given to Charles VI, the Holy Roman Emperor.