From 2nd to 23rd December, Daniel Crouch Rare Books will be exhibiting 100 maps of London, 4 Bury Street, London, SW1Y 6AB. The collection ranges from the “Earliest extant plan of London” by Braun and Hogenberg, 1572, to the First Tube Map, by Harry Beck 1933. Prices from £100 to £16,000, making for a creative and original Christmas present for all budgets!

“The Earliest Extant Plan of London” (£9500), pictured above, depicts 16th Century London in a birds-eye view from the south looking north, and shows St Paul’s with its original spire, which was destroyed in 1561, as well as the new district of Southwark on the south bank of the river, with its theatres, and bull and bear baiting pits. Westminster is connected to the City by a single road, and to the north of Westminster, cows are depicted grazing in open fields.

Also being exhibited is A Descriptive Map of London Poverty by Charles Booth, 1889, (£14,000).  Booth’s object was to give an accurate picture of the condition of London as it was in the last decade of the nineteenth century, and the result is a fascinating map of fundamental importance to British social reform. The colouring of the map depicts, by street: "The Lowest Class. Vicious, semi-criminal" (black); "Very Poor, casual. Chronic Want" (blue); "Poor. 18s to 21s a week for a moderate family" (light blue); "Mixed. Some comfortable, others poor" (purple); "Fairly Comfortable. Good ordinary earnings" (pink); "Well-to-do. Middle class" (red); "Upper-middle and Upper classes. Wealthy" (yellow).

Other highlights of the exhibition include the 2nd earliest printed map of London by Francois de Belleforest, 1575, as well as  landmark maps of London such as Greenwood’s map of London from 1827, which is one of the most beautiful large scale plans of London ever created.

Daniel Crouch Rare Books is a specialist dealer in antique atlases, maps, plans, sea charts and voyages dating from the fifteenth to the nineteenth centuries.  The gallery is open Monday to Friday, 10am to 6pm, 4 Bury Street
St James's, London. Tel. +44(0)20 7042 0240; info@crouchrarebooks.com