Theodore de Bry

When the New World was really new, Theodore de Bry drew inspiration from history’s great explorers to record its wonders. From Virginia and Florida to Brazil, his engravings captivated the European imagination with freshly discovered landscapes, customs, and peoples from the accounts of adventurers such as Sir Francis Drake and Sir Walter Raleigh.

Discovering the Americas

Two new continents revealed by Theodore de Bry

When Flemish engraver and publisher Theodore de Bry issued the first volume of his America series in 1590, the New World was truly novel for most Europeans. Gleaned from the travel accounts of adventurers like Thomas Harriot, Sir Francis Drake, and Sir Walter Raleigh, De Bry’s magnificent engravings brought the new continent and its inhabitants to an enraptured audience across the Atlantic.

From “Virginia” (today’s North Carolina) and Florida to Central America and down into Patagonia, the first nine volumes of America depict scenery and encounters between Native Americans and Europeans, revealing the latter’s perceptions of the former. Portrayals of European discovery and Native American customs were based on the explorers’ reports as well as De Bry’s own imagination – he himself never traveled to the New World. Although based in Frankfurt, De Bry laid the foundations of the series while in London, collaborating with artists John White and Jacques Le Moyne, whose original watercolors he adapted for the opening two volumes. With his sons, De Bry formed a family enterprise known for exquisite copper engravings and high-quality illustrations unrivaled in their mastery.

The legacy of America is profound, coloring Europe’s earliest visions of the Atlantic world. Throughout the following centuries, countless European illustrations would draw inspiration from the spectacular collection. TASCHEN’s edition pays homage to De Bry’s finesse, reprinting all 218 plates from the first nine volumes alongside their respective frontispieces and continental maps. Volumes I to VI are based on the original hand-colored editions held at the John Hay and John Carter Brown Libraries at Brown University in Providence; volumes VII to IX are from the Staats- und Stadtbibliothek in Augsburg, Germany.

Exceptionally rare even at the time of completion, De Bry’s hand-colored America can finally be admired by all.

The authors

Larry E. Tise is a historian and author who has held senior posts with the North Carolina Division of Archives and History and the Benjamin Franklin Memorial, among others. From 2000 to 2015, he served as the Wilbur and Orville Wright Distinguished Professor at East Carolina University, thereafter continuing as adjunct Research Professor. His research centres on early modern exploration, particularly Thomas Harriot and Sir Walter Raleigh, and on the origins of flight. From 2004 to 2025, he examined hand-colored De Bry editions in major American and European research libraries.

Michiel van Groesen is Professor of Maritime History at Leiden University, the Netherlands. He specializes in European representations of the early modern world. His work at the intersection of textual and visual sources has resulted in three books: The Representations of the Overseas World in the De Bry Collection of Voyages (1590–1634), published in 2008, Amsterdam’s Atlantic: Print Culture and the Making of Dutch Brazil (2017) and An Ocean of Rumours: News and Information in the Atlantic World (2026).

Theodore de Bry. The New World. 45th Ed.Hardcover, 15.6 x 21.7 cm, 1.08 kg, 480 pages

ISBN 978-3-8365-9853-8

Edition: English