Pennsylvania founder William Penn supported James II during the Glorious Revolution, James’s attempt to regain the English throne. When William and Mary ascended the throne, Penn was suspected of treason.

The “greatest of early American maps … a masterpiece” (Corcoran).

“This monumental work is without question the finest printed cartographic document relating to North America to be published to date.” (Burden). No other English American colony was mapped in the seventeenth century on such a large scale, and in such amazing detail.

“… there are ffour Comission^rs who by the order & command of y^e said Lord [Baltimore], have beene & are waiting … ever since y^e tenth day instant, for y^e Running y^e Division Lyne…”

Sandelands and Wade, two members of Pennsylvania’s first Provincial Council, alert Deputy Governor Markham of the arrival of Lord Baltimore’s commissioners to Augustine Hermann’s estate, near the disputed border between Maryland and Pennsylvania. Baltimore’s commissioners sought to locate the 40^th degree of latitude, the dividing line established by King Charles I’s original charter for Maryland. Markham did not come, choosing to wait for Penn’s arrival, most likely because he knew that an accurate measurement of the 40˚ line would deprive Pennsylvania of an outlet on the Chesapeake, and perhaps cause them to lose Philadelphia.

“As the loadstone attracts Iron, so ought acknowledgem^ts to pursue faviours … [I] dare not presume any further having soe lately recd soe great a marke of your bounty….”

Deputy Governor Anthony Brockholls of New York extends a cordial note to Governor William Penn in the midst of continuing deliberations between Penn and Lord Baltimore over the southern boundary of Pennsylvania and possession of Delaware.