Theatrum Orbis Terrarum - The Ortelius Atlas
Theatrum
Orbis Terrarum by Abraham Ortelius (1527-1598), a Flemish
scholar and geographer.
Ortelius's Theatrum Orbis Terrarum (Theatre of the World)
is considered the first true atlas in the modern sense: a collection
of uniform map sheets and sustaining text bound to form a book
for which copper printing plates were specifically engraved.
The Ortelius atlas is sometimes referred to as the summary of
sixteenth-century cartography. Many of his atlas's maps were
based upon sources that no longer exist or are extremely rare.
Ortelius appended a unique source list (the "Catalogus Auctorum")
identifying the names of contemporary cartographers, some of
whom would otherwise have remained obscure. More than an original
concept, the Theatrum was also the most authoritative
and successful such work during the late sixteenth and early
seventeenth centuries. Because it was frequently revised to
reflect new geographical and historical insights, contemporary
scholars in western Europe praised the Theatrum highly
for its accuracy, even as they embraced the atlas's concept.
The Theatrum atlas first appeared in 1570 and continued
to be published until 1612. During this period, over seventy-three
hundred copies were printed in thirty-one editions and seven
different languages-a remarkable figure for the time.
The original
1570 Latin edition of the Theatrum mapbook consisted
of seventy maps on fifty-three sheets with accompanying texts.
In the Geography and Map Division of the Library of Congress,
there are copies of each of the four imprints from that edition.
The online collection presents images of the entire third
imprint. This particular volume was unbound for conservation
treatment, thus making individual maps and narratives in the
atlas available for scanning.
Abraham Ortelius, maker of the Theatrum Orbis Terrarum,
is
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