A plan of Tokyo from a later edition of the Abbé Prévost’s travel book, the ‘Histoire Generale des Voyages’. It is based on an earlier map published in Johann Caspar Scheuchzer’s translation of Engelbert Kaempfer’s work on Japan. Bellin has added imaginary formal gardens around the Edo Palace.

Prévost’s work was an expansion of Thomas Astley’s ‘Voyages and Travels’ compiled by Astley from sources including John Atkins, Theodor de Bry and Jean-Baptiste Lavat. The first seven volumes of Astley’s work were translated into French by the Abbé Antoine François Prévost (1697-1763). As well as translating Astley’s work, Prévost added a general history of discoveries and colonisation to his own lifetime, as well as an overview of the historical sources he used.