A Chart of the Straits of Sunda

Samuel Dunn was an English mathematician, astronomer, teacher, and chartmaker whose work was closely connected with eighteenth-century navigation. From 1774 until his death in 1794, he served as hydrographer, nautical teacher, and examiner of pilots for the English East India Company, producing and assessing charts for long-distance maritime navigation. During his tenure with the Company, Dunn produced this chart of the Sunda Strait, a commercially and strategically important passage between Sumatra and Java linking the Indian Ocean with the Java Sea. First published in London in 1774 and issued here in the 1795 edition, it records the strait and part of the north coast of Java as far as Batavia, the principal Dutch centre in the East Indies.

The chart includes the practical information required by mariners navigating these waters: depth soundings, islands, shoals, safe anchorages, coastal profiles, and sailing information. This 1795 issue retains the navigational content of the original chart but omits the date and publisher’s imprint. Instead, it includes the note: “N.B. Pulo or Po is a Malay word signifying an island.” The note reflects the practical needs of English-speaking mariners using local Malay-derived place names in Southeast Asian waters.

Within the collection, this chart is closely connected with earlier Dutch and European charts of the same waters. It relates especially to Robert Dudley’s Sunda Strait chart (223), Johannes van Keulen II’s later Sunda Strait chart (44), the Sunda and Bangka Straits chart (45), and the Sumatra and associated straits chart (225). It also connects with Arnold Colom’s paired East Indies charts (84) and Johannes van Keulen I’s East Indies charts (83and 95), which place the Sunda Strait within the wider mapping of East Indies navigation.