Some vintage maps from an old Bartholomew atlas

Before I dive into today's post, let me state that yesterday was an awesome day for Ephemera Sleuthing on Papergreat.

Yesterday's post was a mystery postcard from an unknown European city. And, within hours, a couple of fine readers helped solve the mystery! Check out the comments section of that post to see how they discovered that Amberg, Germany, was the city in question.

I'm going to do a full wrapup of that detective work in a From the Readers post later this week.

* * *

This is a cover of a slender, undated volume titled Atlas and created by J. Bartholomew, F.R.G.S. It was published in London as part of The People's Books series.

F.R.G.S. are post-nominal letters granted to Fellows of the Royal Geographical Society, which was founded in 1830.

It's hard to know which J. Bartholomew created the maps for this book. The Bartholomews are a family of famed cartographers, and many of them were named John:

• John Bartholomew, Sr. (1805-1861), the founder of John Bartholomew and Son
• John Bartholomew Junior (1831-1893)
• John George Bartholomew (1860-1920)
• John (Ian) Bartholomew (1890-1962)
• John Christopher Bartholomew (1923-2008)

If I had to hazard a guess, I'd say the J. Bartholomew associated with this book is either John Bartholomew Junior or John George Bartholomew.

Here are a few of the fabulous maps featured within Bartholomew's atlas.¹ With all of these, for maximum viewing pleasure, you'll want to click on them to bring up the magnified version.

(This next one is my favorite. It's filled with regions that provided source material for many of Ruth Manning-Sanders' retold fairy tales.)

And, hey, if you look closer at that last map, you can see Amberg!

* * *
As an added bonus, this book contains a bookseller label for L.B. Herr's bookstore in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, on the inside front cover. This is the second label from Herr that I've come across. The first one was discussed in this July 2011 post.

Footnote
1. Want more vintage maps? Check out these previous posts:

• Maps, maps and more maps
• Detail shots from an old map of Venice, Italy
• Maps for the General Motors Futurama at 1964-65 World's Fair
• Illustrated "mapback" on vintage Dell paperback "Death with Death"
• Saturday's postcard: Illustrated map of Tokyo with taijitu symbol
• Bushkill Falls: "A Delightful One-Day Auto Trip"
• Map to help you find Coppini's Silversmith in Florence, Italy