General map of the 'populated and cultivated part' of the colony of Surinam, Section E sheet XV

Title Leupe: Kaart van het bewoonde en bebouwde gedeelte der Colonie Suriname in groot bestek, met eigentijdse bladwijzer.

This is one sheet of Heneman’s multi-sheet, large-scale map of the 'cultivated and inhabited part' of Suriname. The general map and sheet index of this map (see VEL1678) refer to this part as sheet XV in section E. The sheet shows the flow of the Commewijne river and the surrounding plantations. The extent of these plantations is given in Surinamese acres (1 acre = 0,43 hectares), often together with their names. In addition, trails, creeks, and a canal are depicted.

The series was requested in the resolution of the Directors of the Surinam Society from 18 April 1787. In total, the general map is divided into six main blocks or sections, each consisting of twenty sub-sections, executed in the especially large map size of c. 105 x 69 cm. After completion, it was intended to be kept by map block in six separate portfolios, so that the directors could consult each desired part of the enormous map ‘with one glance of the eye’. For his first series of ninety-one sheets, Heneman marked the main section with the letters A to F and also gave each of them its own colour, which is repeated in the margins of the maps and on the covers of the portfolios. These original colour indications are also known from an inventory of the Directorate of the Colony of Surinam dating from May 1796 (Netherlands National Archives 2.01.028.01 recordnr. 187): in it the portfolio containing map sheets of Section A (4 sheets) is described as dark green, B (14 sheets) is yellow, C (13 sheets) is light green, D (20 sheets) is purple, E (20 sheets) is blue and F (20 sheets) is orange. Besides these there was a speckled purple portfolio containing supplementary maps (24 sheets, appendices A to Y) and sheets of newly granted estates in Section C (12 sheets, extra series A to M). Of course, the maps which Heneman made of the land newly assigned for cultivation after this date in Section F and the adjoining Section G are not mentioned in 1796; these are now part of an extra series I to XIX (19 sheets).

North is below.