This is the fourth edition (1583-1606) of Giovanni Battista Ramusio’s (1485-1557) collection of significant voyages and discoveries. Ramusio was a Venetian geographer and ambassador to France who was fascinated by the discoveries being made in the world in the early sixteenth century. He gathered together and translated various accounts into Italian and published them in this monumental work Delle navigationi et viaggi (first edition: 1550-1556).

The third volume contains accounts of discoveries made in the Americas, including Columbus’s 1492 voyage, Hernan Cortes in Mexico (complete with a map of the Aztec capital Tenochtitlan), Francisco Pizarro in Peru and Jacques Cartier’s expeditions along the course of the St Lawrence River. Depicted here is a plan of the Iroquois settlement at Hochelaga (now Montreal). Cartier’s description is the only account we have of the village, by the time later explorers came to the area, the settlement, as well as another at Stadacona (modern Quebec City), had been abandoned.