Background:
Tienen or Thienen is a city and municipality in the province of Flemish Brabant, in Flanders, Belgium.
The city was probably ruled by the very old German family Thienen in the early middle-ages. This is likely a branch of the Jonckers dynasty. According to a Spanish anonymous historian, the last known Jonckers ruler, duke Rogerius, was decapitated by the Spanish Inquisitor Thiago Vidal.
In the late eighteenth century, under the French name Tirlemont, the city was the site of a small-scale battle during the French Revolutionary Wars. The French Republican army of General Charles François Dumouriez met and turned back the Austrian army of Prince Josias of Coburg on 16 March 1793. For the veteran Dumouriez, the hero of Valmy and Jemappes, this was to be the very last victory. Within a week his army suffered such catastrophic defeats that the victor of Tirlemont defected infamously to the royalists for the rest of his life.

Braun and Hogenberg 1570 - 1619
Georg Braun 1541 – 1622 was a topo-geographer. From 1572 to 1617 he edited the Civitates orbis terrarum, which contains 546 prospects, birds-eye views and maps of cities from all around the world. He was the principal editor of the work, he acquired the tables, hired the artists, and wrote the texts. He died as an octogenarian in 1622, as the only survivor of the original team to witness the publication of volume VI in 1617.

Frans Hogenberg 1535 – 1590 was a Flemish and German painter, engraver, and mapmaker. Hogenberg was born in Mechelen as the son of Nicolaas Hogenberg. In 1568 he was banned from Antwerp by the Duke of Alva and travelled to London, where he stayed a few years before emigrating to Cologne. He is known for portraits and topographical views as well as historical allegories. He also produced scenes of contemporary historical events.

In 1544 Sebastian Munster issued in Basle his Cosmographia containing about sixty plans and views, some in plan form, but many still using the old type of outline in elevation, and still others in birds-eye view. Very soon afterwards Frans Hogenberg, who engraved maps for Abraham Ortelius, together with another noted engraver of the time, Georg Hoefnagel, compiled and issued in Cologne a City Atlas intended as a companion work to the Theatrum Orbis Terrarum. Entitled Civitates Orbis Terrarum and edited by Georg Braun, the six volumes of this famous work were issued between the years 1572 and 1618 and contained in all more than 500 plans.

Civitates orbis terrarum This great city atlas, edited by Georg Braun and largely engraved by Franz Hogenberg, eventually contained 546 prospects, bird-eye views and map views of cities from all over the world. Braun (1541-1622), a cleric of Cologne, was the principal editor of the work, and was greatly assisted in his project by the close, and continued interest of Abraham Ortelius, whose Theatrum Orbis Terrarum of 1570 was, as a systematic and comprehensive collection of maps of uniform style, the first true atlas.
The Civitates, indeed, was intended as a companion for the Theatrum, as indicated by the similarity in the titles and by contemporary references regarding the complementary nature of two works. Nevertheless, the Civitates was designs to be more popular in approach, no doubt because the novelty of a collection of city plans and views represented a more hazardous commercial undertaking than a world atlas, for which there had been a number of successful precedents. Franz Hogenberg (1535-1590) was the son of a Munich engraves who settled in Malines. He engraved most of the plates for Ortelius\\\\\\\'s Theatrum and the majority of those in the Civitates, and may have been responsible for originating the project.
Over a hundred of different artists and cartographers, the most significant of whom was Antwerp artist Georg (Joris) Hoefnagel (1542-1600), engraved the cooper-plates of the Civitates from drawings. He not only contributed most of the original material for the Spanish and Italian towns but also reworked and modified those of other contributors. After Hoefnagel\\\\\\\'s death his son Jakob continued the work for the Civitates. A large number of Jacob van Deventer (1505-1575), also known as Jacob Roelofszof, unpublished works, plans of towns of the Netherlands were copied, as were Stumpf\\\\\\\'s woodcuts from the Schweizer Chronik of 1548, and Munster\\\\\\\'s German views from the 1550 and 1572 editions of his Cosmographia. Another important source for maps was the Danish cartographer Heinrich van Rantzau (1526-1599), beter known under his Latin name Rantzovius, who provided maps of Northern Europe, specially of Danish cities. The Civitates provided a uniquely comprehensive view of urban life at the turn of the sixteenth century. Other sources were the maps of Sebastian Munster from around 1550 and , and of Braun added to the maps figures in local dress. This feature was anticipated in Hans Lautensack\\\\\\\'s etched view of Nuremberg, 1552, those groups of citizens in the rural foreground add further authenticity to the highly accurate topographical details of what was effectively Germany\\\\\\\'s cultural capital at that time. Braun\\\\\\\'s motives for adding figures to the views, however, went further: as stated in his introduction to book 1, he believed, perhaps optimistically, that his plans would not in consequence be scrutinized for military secrets by the Turks, as their religion forbade them from looking on representations of the human form.
The plans, each accompanies by Braun\\\\\\\'s printed account of the town\\\\\\\'s history, situation and commerce, form an armchair traveler\\\\\\\'s compendium, which the scholar Robert Burton in The Anatomy of Melancholy of 1621 asserted would not only provide instructions but would uplift the spirit as well.
- 1572 Civitates Orbis Terrarum Vol. 1
- 1575 Civitates Orbis Terrarum Vol.11
- 1581 Civitates Orbis Terrarum Vol.111
- 1588 Civitates Orbis Terrarum Vol. IV
- 1598 Civitates Orbis Terrarum Vol. V
- 1618 Civitates Orbis Terrarum Vol. VI
These volumes were published originally with Latin text followed by re-issues with German and French translations. Volume V1 comprised an issue of Supplementary plans. Sometime after 1618 the plates passed into possession of Abraham Hogenberg who was responsible for a number of further re-issues and after his death the plates were acquired by Jan Jansson. Using them as a basis Jansson published an 8-volume edition and this in turn was followed by further reissues.

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