MORAVIA CZECH REPUBLIC 1598 ORTELIUS UNUSUAL ANTIQUE COPPER ENGRAVED MAP

Moraviae quae olim Marcomannorum sedes, corographia, A. D. Paulo Fabritio Medico et mathematico descripta et a generosis Moraviae Baronibus quibusdam correcta.

Description: Striking and highly detailed fine unusual 1598 Abraham Ortelius's copper engraved map of Moravia, based on Paulus Fabritius' map of 1569, revised by Crato. The map is filled with detail of the cities, rivers, mountains, and forests and adorned with a large strapwork title cartouche, an interesting key in banner form, and a distance scale incorporating the coat of arms and dividers. This is the second state with French text on verso.

Date: 1598 ( undated )

Dimension: Paper size approx.: cm 53,4 x 40,1

Condition: Very strong and dark impression on good paper. Paper with chains and wiremark. Map uncolored. Wide margins. Paper with foxing and browning Map folded. Conditions are as you can see in the images.

Mapmaker: Abraham Ortelius (1527 - 1598) was one of the most important figures in the history of cartography and is most famously credited with the compilation of the seminal 1570 atlas Theatrum Orbis Terrarum, generally considered to be the world's first modern atlas. Ortelius was born in Antwerp and began his cartographic career in 1547 as a typesetter for the Antwerp Guild of St. Luke. In this role Ortelius traveled extensively through Europe where he came into contact with Mercator, under whose influence, he marketed himself as a "scientific geographer". In this course of his long career he published numerous important maps as well as issued several updated editions of his cardinal work, the Theatrum Orbis Terrarum. Late in his career Ortelius was appointed Royal Cartographer to King Phillip II of Spain. On his death in July fourth, 1598, Ortelius' body was buried in St Michael's Præmonstratensian Abbey, Antwerp, where his tombstone reads, Quietis cultor sine lite, uxore, prole.

Jean Jolivet (fl. 1545-1569) Was a French priest and cartographer. Nothing biographically is known of the man, except that he was a cartographer to Frances II, King of France from 1559 to 1560. In 1545 he produced a six-sheet printed map of Berry which is now known in a single copy. His map of France, a woodcut on four sheets, was printed in 1560; this issue was also only known in a single survival, but this is now lost. However this, and the area maps of Bourges, Normandy and Picardy, were at one time well known and provided the source for maps of those regions by Ortelius and De Jode.