Lot Essay
Art dealer and engraver Johann Georg Klinger (1764-1806) was the last great Nuremburg globe-maker. His first pair of globes was published in 1790, although they were already tremendously out of date, using gores originally published in 1726 by Johann Andreae Jnr (1700-1757). On Klinger's death, the firm was run by his widow under the title of Klingers Kunsthandlung. In 1831, control passed to engraver Johann Dreykorn, who worked in co-operation with Johann Bernhard Bauer (1752-1839), father of Carl (1780-1857) and Peter (1783-1847), successful globe-makers in their own right; and with Johann Adam Bhler (1813-1870), another engraver. During this period, the globes continued to be issued under the name of Klingers Kunsthandlung, although some bore the names Klinger, Bauer. In 1852, however, when merchant Carl Abel became manager of the firm, the title was changed to Abel and Klinger's Art Shop before becoming more simply C. Abel Klingers Kunsthandlung. The latter half of the nineteenth-century saw Klinger globes being issued in a variety of languages (including, as here, in English) in an attempt to obtain a share of the European market. The firm was eventually dissolved after World War One.