Description

A detailed map of Valletta with in-set views of Castle of San Angelo and the Castle and Lighthouse of San Elmo was drafted by lieutenant R.H. Smyth, who based in Sicily, surveyed the coasts of Italy and Africa in 1815, following the Napoleonic wars.

Provenience

The present chart bears the handstamps of Deutsches Hydrographisches Institut (German Hydrographical Institute) in Hamburg, where in 1945, following the end of World War II, the Kiel and Wilhelmshaven map libraries were moved and merged into the archive of the newly-formed institute.  The Institut was the successor of the Norddeutsche Seewarte (North German Naval Observatory), and henceforth became the main library of the West German Navy.  The present chart features the handstamp of the Institut, near the title, as well as, in the bottom margin, an ‘Archiv D.H.I.’ handstamp over-stamped with the word ‘Erledigt’ (meaning ‘Deaccessioned’), and well another D.H.I. handstamp labelling chart as a ‘Doppel (Ausleiheexemplar)’, meaning ‘Duplicate’ and ‘Loan Copy’, also over-stamped with ‘Erledigt’.  This mean that the present chart was a duplicate that was officially deaccessioned for the library.  Indeed, following German reunification in 1990, the BHI was reorganized as the Bundesamt für Seeschifffahrt und Hydrographie (BSH, Federal Maritime and Hydrographic Agency of Germany), which had premises in both Hamburg and Rostock.

The BSH decided to deaccession many (usually duplicate) items from its archives, including the present chart.

Worldcat only lists one institutional example (Bibliothèque nationale de France).

References: OCLC 494891965.