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| T. Jefferys sculp (Collection Calculant) |
Print showing a range of compasses and proportional compasses. Signed T. Jefferys sculp. From a page of an Encylopaedia, probably from the late C18 or early C19.1
Thomas Jefferys, Snr (who used the above signature) ~17102−17713 worked as an Engraver and Geographer in the second half of the C18. His shop was situated at the Corner of St. Martins Lane near Charing Cross where he had on sale a “great Variety of Prints English and Foreign by the most Celebrated Masters And all Sorts of Maps and Globes”4
An article in http://MapForum.com notes that Laurence Worms has contributed the entry on Jefferys to the forthcoming edition of the Dictionary of National Biography and believes that Jefferys was born in 1719, the son of Henry Jefferys, Cutler, of St. James Clerkenwell, although his place of birth is uncertain. Worms has also located his apprenticeship, in December 1735, to the engraver and mapmaker Emanuel Bowen. Jefferys was freed from his apprenticeship in 1744. More reliably, Jefferys engraved some maps for Richard Pococke’s A Description Of The East, And Some Other Countries … (London: 1743–1745), including map of Cyprus in volume 2. In 1746, Jefferys was appointed Geographer to Frederick, Prince of Wales, and in 1757, Geographer to George, Prince of Wales, later George III.5
An advertisement for Thomas Jeffery’s shop, held by David Rumsey Historical Map Collection, from ~1750,6 is shown below.
1 Since the drawings show the short “s” form in “compasses” (rather than “compaſſes”) this might suggest that it was printed during or after 1795–1810 when the transition was firmly under way in printing in the US and England from the older long form of “ſ” to the modern “s” form. In the US this transition was finalised by an Act of Congress in 1803. However, Thomas Jeffries in his own advertisements from as early as 1750 uses a modern “s” so the plate may in fact reproduce the title that he printed on it with his careful engraver’s hand, and be contemporaneous with his life. (↑)
2 Ephemera Thomas Jefferys Sr: Two engraved advertisement labels viewed 19 May 2012. (↑)
3 http://portal.digmap.eu/index/kbr/aut/J/EN/kbr_1_1472228.digmap_jefferysthomasca.html viewed 19 May 2012 (↑)
4 See David Rumsey Map Collection viewed 19 May 2012. (↑)
5 Further information including the documentary basis for this description can be found at Ephemera Thomas Jefferys Sr: Two engraved advertisement labels viewed 19 May 2012. (↑)
6 Reproduced from David Rumsey Historical Map Collection viewed 19 May 2012 (↑)
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