Map of Asia, Tartary, Japan, the Philippines and the East Indies

The map engraved by G. van Gouwen and published by Carel Allard around 1690 depicts Asia according to the Dutch perspective of the era of the great trading companies, particularly the VOC. The term Tartary indicates the vast and vague region of northern and central Asia, still little known to European cartographers, encompassing Siberia, Mongolia, and Manchuria. Japan, the Philippines, and the East Indies are depicted with greater precision, a direct reflection of Dutch maritime trade and colonial interests in Southeast Asia. The whole combines practical purposes – a guide for merchants and navigators – and a celebratory function of Dutch commercial power on the global stage at the end of the seventeenth century.

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