17TH CENTURY MAP OF LEIDEN 1652

Joan Blaeu

Paper
42 ⨯ 53 cm
€ 2.150

Inter-Antiquariaat Mefferdt & De Jonge

• About the artwork
  "LUGDUNUM BATAVORUM vernacule Leyden." Copper engraving published in Amsterdam in 1649 by Joan Blaeu as part of his town book "Toneel der Steden van de Vereenighde Nederlanden" [Theatre of towns of the United Netherlands]. Coloured by a later hand. Verso: Latin text. Size: 42 x 53.7 cm. Leiden, the fourth-largest city in Holland, was a significant town in the 17th century, primarily due to the university founded there in 1575. Leiden was given this university as gratitude for its brave resistance against the Spaniards in the Eighty Years' War. The town was built around the Burcht, an artificial cone-shaped hill on which a circular tuffstone refuge castle was constructed in the 12th century. This castle stands where two branches of the Rhine converge, precisely in the middle of the town. The settlement developed as a dike village on the southern Rhine dike, the Breestraat, and became the center of trade and shipping in the rapidly developing agricultural surroundings. Remarkably, Leiden lacks large squares or marketplaces. At the time this map was made, Leiden was at the peak of its prosperity. Joan Blaeu writes (in Latin on the verso side of the map): the town is strong and well-built, equipped with sturdy gates, solid ramparts, and broad moats, making it well-defensible. Outside the walls, there is a wide moat beautifully planted with elms, providing a pleasant place for relaxation. Blaeu further notes that Leiden was next to Amsterdam, due to its recent expansions, the largest city in this province [Holland]. It had 89 streets and alleys and 102 stone bridges. (Be sure to watch the interesting video featuring a 3D version of the map.) The Amsterdam-based cartographer and publisher Joan Blaeu aimed to achieve the objectives of earlier publishers Abraham Ortelius and Georg Braun & Franz Hogenberg simultaneously by including a series of town books in his extensive world atlas. Blaeu's Toneel der Steden van de Vereenighde Nederlanden was published in Latin in 1649; the Dutch edition was printed in 1652. Some of the maps included in this work had been published in earlier atlases—21, for example, in Marcus van Boxhorn's Theatrum Hollandiae from 1632. Other maps were entirely newly created for Blaeu's town book. It is known that Blaeu wrote letters to city councils requesting maps and descriptions for inclusion in his work. Price: Euro 2.150,- (incl. frame)
• About the artist

  Joan Blaeu (1596-1673), was born on the 23rd of September in 1596 in Alkmaar.
  
  He was a Dutch cartographer born in Alkmaar. He followed the footsteps of his father, cartographer Willem Blaeu.
  
  In 1620 he became a doctor of law but he joined the work of his father. In 1635 they published the Atlas Novus (full title: Theatrum orbis terrarum, sive, Atlas novus) in two volumes. Joan and his brother Cornelius took over the studio after their father died in 1638. Joan became the official cartographer of the Dutch East India Company.
  
  Blaeu's world map, Nova et Accuratissima Terrarum Orbis Tabula, incorporating the discoveries of Abel Tasman, was published in 1648. This map was revolutionary in that it "depicts the solar system according to the heliocentric theories of Nicolaus Copernicus, which show the earth revolving around the sun.... Although Copernicus's groundbreaking book On the Revolutions of the Spheres had been first printed in 1543, just over a century earlier, Blaeu was the first mapmaker to incorporate this revolutionary heliocentric theory into a map of the world."
  
  Blaeu's map was copied for the map of the world set into the pavement of the Groote Burger-Zaal of the new Amsterdam Town Hall, designed by the Dutch architect Jacob van Campen (now the Amsterdam Royal Palace), in 1655.
  
  Blaeu's Hollandia Nova was also depicted in his Archipelagus Orientalis sive Asiaticus published in 1659 in the Kurfürsten Atlas (Atlas of the Great Elector). and used by Melchisédech Thévenot to produce his map, Hollandia Nova—Terre Australe (1664).
  
  As "Jean Blaeu", he also published the 12 volume "Le Grand Atlas, ou Cosmographie blaviane, en laquelle est exactement descritte la terre, la mer, et le ciel". One edition is dated 1663. That was folio (540 x 340 mm), and contained 593 engraved maps and plates. In March 2015, a copy was on sale for £750,000.
  
  Around 1649 Joan Blaeu published a collection of Dutch city maps named Toonneel der Steeden (Views of Cities). In 1651 he was voted into the Amsterdam council. In 1654 Joan published the first atlas of Scotland, devised by Timothy Pont. In 1662 he reissued the Atlas Novus, also known as Atlas Maior, in 11 volumes, and one for oceans.
  
  A cosmology was planned as their next project, but a fire destroyed the studio completely in 1672.
  
  Joan Blaeu died in Amsterdam the following year, 1673. He was buried in the Westerkerk at Amsterdam.

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