Details
PTOLEMY (Claudius Ptolemaeus). Geographia universalis. Translated from Greek into Latin by Willibald Pirckheimer (1470-1530), edited by Sebastian Münster (1488-1552). Basel: Heinrich Petri, August 1545.
2o (305 x 205 mm). Collation: aa4 *6 a-c6 A-N6 (preliminaries, index, text); 1-542 (full-sheet woodcut maps, letterpress within woodcut borders on recto of the first leaf of each bifolium); Aa-Bb6 Cc8 (Münster's appendix). Roman and italic types, double column, woodcut of Ptolemy observing the stars, woodcut diagrams (some full-page) and initials. 54 DOUBLE-PAGE WOODCUT MAPS, half of which are Ptolemaean, the remainder modern (world, the American continent, the East Indies and regions in Europe, Asia and Africa). (Title strengthened at inner margin, minor repair to map 7, tear in fold of map 21, browning and occasional staining, notably on map 51 and colophon leaf.) 18th-century Italian vellum, blue edges. Provenance: anonymous owner (Sotheby Parke Bernet, 13 May 1974, lot 149).
Third edition of Münster's Ptolemy, with SIX MORE NEW MAPS added by the editor than in the first and second editions of 1540 and 1542. At the same time as bringing Ptolemy up to date by adding text and new maps to the ancient recension, Münster was working on his own Cosmographia. Beschreibung aller Länder, which he entrusted to the same publisher (1544 with 24 maps, 1545 with 28 maps). Adams P-2228; Alden & Landis 545/22; Sabin 66487.
2o (305 x 205 mm). Collation: aa4 *6 a-c6 A-N6 (preliminaries, index, text); 1-542 (full-sheet woodcut maps, letterpress within woodcut borders on recto of the first leaf of each bifolium); Aa-Bb6 Cc8 (Münster's appendix). Roman and italic types, double column, woodcut of Ptolemy observing the stars, woodcut diagrams (some full-page) and initials. 54 DOUBLE-PAGE WOODCUT MAPS, half of which are Ptolemaean, the remainder modern (world, the American continent, the East Indies and regions in Europe, Asia and Africa). (Title strengthened at inner margin, minor repair to map 7, tear in fold of map 21, browning and occasional staining, notably on map 51 and colophon leaf.) 18th-century Italian vellum, blue edges. Provenance: anonymous owner (Sotheby Parke Bernet, 13 May 1974, lot 149).
Third edition of Münster's Ptolemy, with SIX MORE NEW MAPS added by the editor than in the first and second editions of 1540 and 1542. At the same time as bringing Ptolemy up to date by adding text and new maps to the ancient recension, Münster was working on his own Cosmographia. Beschreibung aller Länder, which he entrusted to the same publisher (1544 with 24 maps, 1545 with 28 maps). Adams P-2228; Alden & Landis 545/22; Sabin 66487.
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Rebecca Starr