Churchill, Awnsham, d. 1728 - compiler. After Johann Nieuhof (1618–1672).

St. Anthony / St. Vincent [18th-Century Copperplate View of Cape Verde Island Villages • Portuguese Colonial & Enslaved Life]

London: John Walthoe et.al. c.1744–1746.

1740s Churchill / Nieuhof copperplate—double view of Cape Verde villages, with Portuguese colonists and enslaved figures, from A Collection of Voyages and Travels.

Physical description: Copperplate engraving on laid paper, double-view format, showing villages labeled “St. Anthony” (upper image) and “St. Vincent” (lower image). Sheet size approx. 35.5 × 42 cm (14 × 16.5 in.); platemark / engraved area approx. 29 × 35 cm (11.5 × 13.9 in.). Lettered at top margin with volume and placement note: “V. II… In ye East Indies… betwixt page 147, 148,” and plate number “5” at lower right. Centerfold as issued.

Condition: Very Good overall. A bit of separation developing at the lower 1.5 in. of the centerfold; light, even age-toning; two small fox marks at the upper edge, away from the image area. Impression still strong with good detail in figures, animals, and landscape. Uncolored, as issued.

Expanded narrative / content: This double-view plate presents early engraved images of Cape Verde island settlements as seen through the eyes of Dutch traveler Johann Nieuhof, issued in English in Churchill’s monumental Collection of Voyages and Travels. The upper scene (“St. Anthony”) shows conical and pitched-roof dwellings at the base of mountainous terrain, with Portuguese figures and enslaved Africans engaged in conversation and daily labor. The lower scene (“St. Vincent”) emphasizes subsistence and provisioning: goats graze in the foreground while tortoises and game are brought into camp, and a large cauldron over an open fire suggests the preparation of turtle or goat meat.

The plate captures vernacular architecture, landscape, and colonial hierarchy in a compact visual document: domestic animals, cooking, and leisure in the foreground; enslaved labor and hunting activity in the mid-ground; and the stark, rocky profiles of the Cape Verde islands behind. The composition and subject closely match examples identified by institutions and print specialists as views of Santo Antão and São Vicente in the Cape Verde archipelago, rather than the East Indies.

Originally published in Volume II of Churchill’s A Collection of Voyages and Travels, one of the major English compilations of global travel narratives, this plate sits at the intersection of:
+++ Early European visual documentation of the Atlantic islands,
+++ Portuguese imperial presence, and
+++ Enslaved African labor in the mid-17th to early-18th century Atlantic world. 

As such, it will interest:
+++ Print collectors specializing in 18th-century travel and exploration
+++ Collectors and institutions focused on the Atlantic world, Cape Verde, and slavery studies
+++ Decorative print buyers looking for an original 18th-century village scene with strong human and animal detail
+++ For institutions, it offers teachable visual evidence of how European travel compilations pictured peripheral colonial spaces and enslaved communities for metropolitan readers.

Iconography Note: This engraving contains an 18th-century European depiction of enslaved Africans within a Portuguese colonial setting. It is presented as a historical document of its time, valuable for the study of empire, race, and the Atlantic world, and not as an endorsement of the social hierarchies it portrays.

Subjects: Cape Verde Islands (Santo Antão & São Vicente); Portuguese Colonial Villages; Enslaved Africans; 18th-Century Copperplate Engraving; Churchill Collection of Voyages and Travels; Johann Nieuhof; Atlantic Slavery & Labor; Colonial Architecture & Vernacular Housing, Exploration & Travel Prints; Atlantic World History; Colonial Studies

Item #21350

Price: $185.00