The Arctic North-East and West Passage

This short work contains texts and maps relating to early exploration and trade routes. Included here are descriptions of Russia and Siberia by Isaac Massa (1586-1643), a Dutch merchant and diplomat; one of the memorials relating to Pacific discoveries by the Portuguese explorer Pedro Fernandes de Queirós (c.1565-1615); and maps by the cartographer Hessel Gerritsz (c.1581-1632) showing the discoveries of the English navigator Henry Hudson (d.1611). Gerritsz originally compiled these materials and published them in Dutch, and they were soon translated into Latin to increase their readership. In the present work, first published in 1878, reproductions of the Dutch and Latin editions from 1612 and 1613 are presented together by Frederik Muller (1817-81). To encourage research on these texts, Muller also included a new English translation, and an explanatory essay by his son Samuel Muller (1848-1922).