Peru. Original antique map by Sidney Hall. Published by Longmans in 1840. Original colour.

Original antique map by Sidney Hall.
Published 1840 by Longman & Co.
Steel engraved.
Original hand colouring.

Sidney Hall was a British engraver and cartographer well known and popular for his early nineteenth century atlases containing maps of the United Kingdom and of the ancient world reproduced from Hall’s engravings. Hall made engravings for a number of international atlases at a time when cartography and atlases were very popular. He also engraved a series of cards for the various constellations, published c.1825 in a boxed set called Urania’s Mirror.

Hall engraved maps forWilliam Faden,Aaron Arrowsmith, andChapman & Hall, among many others.

In 1809 he operated at 5 Vine Street, Piccadilly, London. In 1814 he was in partnership with Michael Thomson operating at 14 Bury Street in the Bloomsbury District and later was listed at 18 Bury Street. Hall is credited with “almost certainly” being the first engraver to use steel plates in map engraving.