Lapie P. Carte réduite de la Mer Méditerranée et de la Mer Noire dédiée et présentée à l’Empereur et Roi. Paris 1808 Impressive (200x80cm,) two meters long, copper engraved nautical map of Mediterranean and Black seas, after Rizzi-Zannoni and Lapie. First edition of this famous chart which was the best of Mediterranean for mariners up the 1830s. The work for the chart of western Mediterranean had finished in 1804 by the famous Rizzi-Zannoni, geographer of the King of Sicily that time; Lapie improved Eastern Mediterranean’s older French charts with newly acquired measurements and material for the Greek areas and Cyprus from French officers of the Mediterranean fleet. For the Black sea, he relied on a map published in 1804 at St Petersburg. This chart has been presented to Napoleon. The huge chart is composed by 4 independent sheets of 80x50cm each, loose as published. Minor defects: edges of sheets frayed, middle folds strengthened at the back with result very slightly browned, spotting in the relevant front areas, few dusty marks, but overall a very good copy of a fine chart. It is the first Mediterranean plan that covers more or less accurately, for its time, the Greek seas and Cyprus. The chart has been revised up to 1840 (editions of 1814,1828,1830 and 1840), but the first edition is the rarest and, by far, the most important, as it marks the chartering achievements of the French of the very early 19th century, a time that they were dominant at world cartography (before the emergence of the British). Five copies, all at public libraries worldwide (BNF, Strasburg, Bayerische, Weimar and Amsterdam). A landmark of the sea chartering of Greece and Cyprus. Extremely rare