NOTE ON AGAS’S MAP AT THE END OF THE VOLUME
Ralph Agas was born about 1540. He was a land-surveyor, and his chief claim to notice lies in the three maps or plans he made of London, Oxford, and Cambridge. Of these the one reproduced in this volume, entitled “A Survey of the Cities of London and Westminster, the Borough of Southwark and parts adjacent,” was engraved by Edward J. Francis, and edited by W. H. Overall, F.S.A. Mr. Overall made a careful examination of all the facts, and believes that the original map of Agas was not made earlier than the year 1591, though it has been commonly supposed to have been made about 1560. Of the original, two copies are extant—one in the Guildhall, and the other in the Pepysian Collection at Magdalen College, Oxford.
In 1737 G. Vertue published a copy of Agas’s map, altering the original in many important particulars, which are enumerated by Mr. Overall in his account of the map. Among these may be mentioned the water-bearers seen off Tower Stairs and the Steelyard, filling their casks, which are slung across the backs of horses, by the aid of a long-handled ladle. In Vertue’s map this interesting detail is turned into a meaningless one, namely, a man driving cows into the water with a whip. In Agas the figures seen in the fields are in Elizabethan costume; in Vertue’s map they are in the costume of William III.’s reign. Other particulars omitted in Vertue are the royal barge in mid-stream off Baynard’s Castle; the Martello Tower at the mouth of the Fleet; the Chapter House and the Church of St. Gregory on the south side of St. Paul; and various other points. By noting these details, Vertue’s spurious reproduction can be at once distinguished from the genuine map of Agas.