Claudius Ptolemaeus | Geographicae enarrationis libri octo, Strassburg, 1525, contemporary Venetian burgundy morocco, including one of the earliest Ptolemaic maps of America

Claudius Ptolemaeus

Geographicae enarrationis libri octo Bilibaldo Pirckeym hero interprete, annotationes Joannis de Regiomonte in errores commissos a Jacobo Angelo in translatione sua. [Strassburg: Johannes Grüninger for Johannes Koberger, 3 April 1525]

Folio (398 x 262 mm), printed title within elaborate woodcut border, 50 woodcut maps (comprising: 27 double-page maps of the ancient world, 22 double-page maps of the modern world, one full-page map of Lotharingia on verso of map 46), most with Latin text on versos enclosed in elaborate woodcut borders, woodcut diagrams in-text (one by Dürer), including one full-page of an armillary sphere, contemporary Venetian burgundy morocco, boards with rectangular frame stamped in blind with arabesque tool, in the inner corners of the rectangular frame an acorn tool, central blind-stamped lozenge-shaped frame, in centre a gilt roundel enclosing the title "‣CL‣|‣PTOL|OMEI|**" on upper cover and with name of an unidentified patron on lower cover ("**|‣LVD‣|‣VA‣|***"), manuscript title in an early modern hand to bottom edge of textblock, preliminary text leaves with wormhole at inner margin (not affecting text), maps 32, 49 and 50 with small hole (not affecting printed portion on maps 49 and 50), slight browning, foxing, and marginal dampstaining throughout, rebacked and recornered, endleaves renewed

In 1522, an edition of the Geographia had been printed in Strassburg by Johannes Grüninger. The maps reduced versions of those prepared by Waldseemuller for the 1513 Strassburg Ptolemy, while three new maps were compiled and cut for the printing. With the exception of the Ptolemaic map Quinta Asiae tabula, these blocks were reprinted in 1525 for the present edition, with the text retranslated by the humanist and scholar Willibald Pirckheimer of Nuremberg. The “modern” world map Orbis typus universalis iuxta hydrographorum traditionem by Laurens Fries (1522) after Martin Waldseemüller (1513) is one of the earliest printed maps in an edition of Ptolemy to include the name “America” (Shirley, Mapping of the World 48). The other “modern” world map, Diefert situs orbis hydrographorum ab eo quem Ptolemeus posuit, is reduced from Waldseemüller's corresponding map of 1513 (Shirley, Mapping of the World 49). The woodcut borders which enclose the text on the versos of most of the maps are thought to have been the work of Hans Holbein.

PROVENANCE:

Bound for an unidentified sixteenth-century owner, with name "**|‣LVD‣|‣VA‣|***" enclosed in gilt roundel on lower cover

LITERATURE:

Nordenskiöld Collection 2:208; Phillips, Atlases 362: Sabin 66482; USTC 622807; VD16 P 5211