World map--Wang Jun Fu

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An important milestone in the history of Sino-Japanese cartography. This world map is a Japanese copy of a Chinese map published in Suzhou by Wang Jun Fu in 1663. It has Chinese text and retains the original date (Kangxi 2). The Japanese printer Umemura Mihaku was active in Kyoto during the 1670s and 1680s.

The Wang Jun Fu map is in turn based on a Ming dynasty map entitled Tianxia jiubian fenye renji luceng quan tu by Cao Junyi which was privately printed in Nanjing in 1644, the dynasty’s final year. This may in fact be the reason for retaining the dynastic name of Ming in the title of this map, some twenty years after the Qing dynasty had been established.

The text at the top gives a brief introduction to the countries of the world and makes some general remarks about the sources for this map. The legend on the right provides details of twenty-nine strategic border crossings, and on the left details are given of thirty-three foreign countries including mythical ones taken from the ancient text Shanhai Jing. European and African place names are taken from Jesuit sources, specifically Matteo Ricci’s world map printed at Beijing in 1602. However, the map abandons Ricci’s comparative accuracy and shows China in the traditional manner, occupying about 75% of the world, with Europe and Africa crammed in at the edge.

The text at the bottom gives distances and statistical details of the thirteen provinces and two capitals (Beijing and Nanjing), with figures on population, taxation and commodities (including rice, wheat, silk, cotton, horse fodder and salt).