Tertiae partis Asiae quae modernis India orientalis dicitur acurata delineatio

Gerard de Jode was an Antwerp engraver, publisher, and mapmaker whose Speculum orbis terrae was first published in 1578 as a competitor to Abraham Ortelius’s Theatrum orbis terrarum (for the 1584 edition see 252). Although de Jode’s atlas was admired for its engraving and cartographic quality, it was much less commercially successful than Ortelius’s atlas. After Gerard’s death, the Speculum was reissued in 1593 by Arnold Coninx under the direction of Cornelis de Jode.

This map of Eastern Asia and the East Indies was first published in Gerard de Jode’s Speculum orbis terrae in 1578 and appears here in the posthumous 1593 edition issued by Arnold Coninx. The 1593 edition is typographically distinct from the first edition: the 1578 maps use Roman numeral pagination, while the 1593 edition uses Arabic numerals. The verso of this example bears the Latin heading Asiae tertiae pars sive India and is marked Fol. 10, confirming its place in the later edition. The map draws heavily on Giacomo Gastaldi’s influential 1561 map Il disegno della terza parte dell’ Asia. It preserves several Italian inscriptions describing marvels, peoples, and natural features, including references to pearl-bearing lakes, woolly oxen in northwestern China, and spirits said to mislead travellers in the Lop Desert. These details show how inherited travel literature and geographical lore remained part of printed mapmaking.

Southeast Asia and the East Indies are shown in considerable detail. The Philippines, the Moluccas, Borneo, Java, Sumatra, and nearby island groups are densely named, while an erupting volcano appears beneath the title cartouche. Islands such as Ternate, Tidore, Bachian, Messana, Zubut, and Zolo are identified as places associated with spices, medicinal plants, and Asian trade.

Within the collection, this map is closely connected with Gerard de Jode’s broader Asiae novissima tabula (373), Cornelis de Jode’s Novae Guineae forma, & situs (133), and the polar hemispheres (112). Together, these works show how the de Jode atlas treated Asia, the East Indies, New Guinea, and the uncertain southern world. For later Dutch atlas treatments of the same region, compare Jodocus Hondius I’s East Indies map (80and 272) and Henricus Hondius’s India quae orientalis dicitur, et insulae adjacentes (459)