Peter’s Triumph

Cornelius Cruys (1657–1727)
Nieuw pas-kaart boek [A New Book of Charts]
Amsterdam: Hendrick Doncker, [1703–4]
NYPL, Map Division

In this allegorical title-page image, the foot of a youthful Tsar Peter rests on the maroon and gold crescent ensign of the Ottoman Empire, an allegory for his wresting of the Crimean city of Azov from the Ottomans in 1696. The River Don (in classical Greek, Tanais) is characterized by a merman with a horn of plenty from which flows its wealth.

Born Niles Olufson Olsen in Stavanger, Norway, Cornelius Cruys rose in the Dutch maritime service to a senior position at the Admiralty in Amsterdam. There, in 1697, he met Tsar Peter, who appointed him the first vice-admiral of the nascent Russian navy. An accomplished hydrographer, he produced this book of charts, the only example of his work known to survive.