The Picturesque Atlas of Australasia

The Picturesque Atlas of Australasia was a monumental undertaking by the Picturesque Atlas Publishing Co Ltd of Sydney & Melbourne who produced a large folio format (about A3 sized) Atlas published in Australia the late 1880's. Unlike a modern atlas the main part was descriptive text rather than solely a book of maps. The total page count was around eight hundred and it was printed black and white on heavy quality paper especially manufactured, and on a printing press especially imported for the project. Included were some eight hundred steel and wood engravings as illustrations. The general Editor was Andrew Garran M.A., L.L.D., M.L.C., but most of the articles were written by leading historians, geographers, and natural history experts. The engravings were created by prominent and well-known artists. The Atlas was first issued in forty-two monthly parts and sold only by subscription. The company and their agents remarkably managed to sell some 50,000 subscriptions to a population much smaller than now. Each part usually had eighteen numbered pages plus an un-numbered full page engraving and the whole was issued with a card cover. Some parts included coloured maps as well, often double sized. Each part was priced at five shillings making the full set ten pounds, ten shillings or ten guineas. In the money of 2024 this equates to approximately Aus$45.00 a part or $1900 for the set. It was expected that buyers would have their parts made into Volumes and many did so at their own expense, although the individual parts are still to be found on the second-hand market. Effectively the publication was designed to fall into three large and heavy volumes. These were, and before Federation;

Volume I. Early Discoveries, Captain Cook, Early Settlement, New South Wales History and topography, Sydney, NSW Towns, Victoria History and topography, Melbourne.

Volume II. South Australia Description and History, Tasmania Description, Queensland Description and History, Western Australia History.

Volume III. New Zealand Historical and Descriptive Sketch, Provinces and areas of the country, Insular Australia (New Guinea, Fiji, Tonga, Samoa, etc,) Australian Aborigines, Flora & Fauna of Australasia, Geology, Mining, Farming, Railways, and People of the area.

Reprints.

Shortly after the initial sales the whole publication was reprinted twice and sold in complete matching volumes. These too are seen on the second-hand market. In 1974 Volumes I and II were reprinted in a reduced A4 format and in one physical book under the title "Australia The First Hundred Years." The original maps were not reproduced but this is otherwise a complete reprint, albeit in a smaller size. A similar reprint occurred in 1980 for Volume III under the title "New Zealand The First hundred Years." Unfortunately this is an incomplete version as it only included the New Zealand data, and neither were any maps reproduced.

Online editions

Both the National Library of Australia and the University of Queensland have online versions of the Atlas available.

Further reading

• "Paper Nation" by Tony Hughes-D'Aeth (2001) gives the story of the Atlas in greater detail.