Braun & Hogenberg
Map of Cambridge
Engraving with later hand colouring
34 x 45 cm
This map is taken from the Civitates Orbit Terrarium, also known as the ‘Braun & Hogenberg.’ This work is the culmination of a fifty year collaboration between Braun and Hogenberg, containing 546 prospects, bird’s-eye views and maps of cities from all around the world. Of these 546 works, 363 were engravings and this particular edition stands out as one of the beautiful and vibrant maps treated to meticulous hand-colouring.
Georg Braun was born in Cologne in 1541 and worked as a topo-geographer. As principal editor of the work, he acquired the tables, hired the artists and cartographers and wrote the texts, including the Latin article on ‘Cantabrigia’ found on the reverse of this engraving. He died as an octogenarian in 1622, the only survivor of the original team to witness the publication of volume VI.
Frans Hogenberg was born in 1535 in Mechelen in Flanders and worked as a painter, engraver and mapmaker. He was notably exiled from Antwerp in 1568 by the Duke of Alva because he was Protestant and had printed engravings sympathising with the Beeldenstorm (the Great Iconoclasm, a historical event in which many forms of church fittings and decoration were destroyed as part of the Protestant Reformation). He then moved to London for a brief period before settling in Cologne, where he worked with Braun on the Civitates.
Condition: Generally very good.
