Cosmographers - Cosmographia

Very interesting woodblock sheet from the 1570 German edition of Sebastian Muenster's Cosmographie shows an allegory of Cosmographers.

Page size: Around 9 X 14 inches

Condition: Some light browing and discoloration, a few faint spots as shown. Sheet is quite worn. Paper a bit fragile. Would still look wonderful framed.

Sebasian Muenster

Sebastian Muenster was born in 1488 at Ingelheim, (Germany) and died in 1552 in Basel, (Switzerland).

Muenster was the true renaissance man: historian, mathematician, geographer, and linguist. For a time he was a Franciscan Monk. After the reformation, he converted to Protestantism. He taught Hebrew at the University of Heidelberg before settling in Basel in 1529.

As a cartographer, he is perhaps best known for his book the Cosmographia published in 1544 which aimed to give a comprehensive picture of the known world in the 16th Century.

Muenster's other works include an illustrated Latin edition of Ptolemy's Geographia with illustrations, a triligual dictionary in Greek, Latin and Hebrew and the Mappa Europae or map of Europe (1536).

A portrait of Sebastian Muenster appeared on the old German DM notes that were published before the 1990s.

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Sebastian Muenster