1572 BRAUN, G. / HOGENBERG, F. - Civitas Francofordiana ad Moe [FRANKFURT/MAIN].

A fine copper engraved birds-eye view of Frankfurt am Main from the first volume of Braun & Hogenberg's "Civitas Orbis Terrarum. " Latin text to verso. From: Civitates Orbis Terrarum, Liber Primus. Köln.
TRANSLATION OF CARTOUCHE TEXT: Frankfurt is a unique city in East Franconia, or rather, at its extremity, lying on the Main, the most famous trade city in all Germany, very well known amongst all the peoples of Europe; the Roman Emperor is elected here by the most illustrious College of Seven, the Electors, and the fencing masters designated. [...]
In his treatise on Germany, Franciscus Irenicus attests that he has seen in a monastery a description of Frankfurt in seven books, written by a deacon named Entrandus. Connected to Frankfurt by an elegant stone bridge is Sachsenhausen, a town of no ordinary magnificence. Frankfurt is surrounded by bulwarks, walls, ramparts and moats that are exceptionally well designed for defensive purposes.
COMMENTARY BY BRAUN: "The largest and most magnificent part of the city is called Frankfurt, the other Sachsenhausen, which is also surrounded by walls and moats. Frankfurt is a leading centre of trade not just in Germany but in Europe.
For twice a year, before Easter, in the middle of Lent, and in autumn, large numbers of merchants come from Lower and Upper Germany and from many other parts of the world to the annual fairs here. Emperor Charles IV also had a particular liking for this city, and therefore he moved the election of the kings and emperors of the Romans to here and confirmed this in his Golden Bull."

An impressive bird's-eye view from the southwest of the powerful trade city of Frankfurt, in 1605 home to 20,000 people. St Batholomew's cathedral, coronation church of the German kings and emperors, stands on the hill at the core of the original settlement on the right bank of the Main. On the Römerberg hill further left, the Römer and Goldener Schwan houses served as the town hall from 1405 onwards; to their right lies the Gothic councillors' church of St Nicholas.
Identified in the Sachsenhausen quarter are the church of the Magi (H. Drei Konig), which became Frankfurt's first Protestant church in 1525, and the house of the Teutonic Knights (Teutsch Hauss). Frankfurt had been established as an international trade-fair centre and city of commerce in the Middle Ages: its autumn fair had been running since the 12th century and the spring fair since 1330.
By around 1600 the book fair in this publishing city had already assumed international proportions. Frankfurt's commercial and fair activities meant that countless different currencies were in circulation. Around 1585 exchange rates and rules of trade were introduced, in a move seen as marking the birth of the Frankfurt stock exchange.
In 1147 Frankfurt was also assured a special position within the Empire, as the site of the election of German kings, a role officially confirmed by the Golden Bull of 1356; from 1562 to 1792 the coronation of the Emperor also took place in Frankfurt cathedral. (Taschen)

The 'Civitates Orbis Terrarum', or the "Braun & Hogenberg", is a six-volume town atlas and the greatest book of town views and plans ever published: 363 engravings, sometimes beautifully colored. It was one of the best-selling works in the last quarter of the 16th century. Georg Braun wrote the text accompanying the plans and views on the verso.
A large number of the plates were engraved after the original drawings of Joris Hoefnagel (1542-1600), who was a professional artist. The first volume was published in Latin in 1572, the sixth volume in 1617. Frans Hogenberg created the tables for volumes I through IV, and Simon van den Neuwel created those for volumes V and VI. Other contributors were cartographer Daniel Freese, and Heinrich Rantzau. Works by Jacob van Deventer, Sebastian Münster, and Johannes Stumpf were also used. Translations appeared in German and French.

Reference: Van der Krogt 4, 1361, State 2; Taschen, Braun and Hogenberg, p.95.

Civitates Orbis Terrarum

The Civitates Orbis Terrarum (Atlas of Cities of the World) was the second-oldest printed atlas in world cartography and the first atlas of towns. Its principal creators and authors were the theologian and editor Georg Braun, the most important engraver and publisher Frans Hogenberg, the engraver Simon van den Neuvel, the artist and draftsman Georg (Joris) Hoefnagel, the topographer Jacob van Deventer and others. Although published outside the Netherlands, the Civitates is nevertheless one of the best examples of the Antwerp school of cartography.
Key figures in the school included Abraham Ortelius, Gerardus Mercator, and several other geographers. The Civitates reflects the Flemish engraving style typical of Dutch atlases of the period. In addition, correspondence among Braun, Hogenberg, and Ortelius clearly indicates that they conceived the atlas in Antwerp.

The atlas contains more than 500 maps and represents an entire era in the history of town mapping. The atlas was published in six volumes between 1572 and 1617. To obtain the originals for his work, Braun corresponded extensively with map sellers and scholars in different cities and countries. The authors also conducted their own investigations.
However, these were not true geodetic surveys, but detailed on-location drawings of panoramic views of the towns made from some high point. Georg Hoefnagel made most of the engravings that decorate the Civitates, from its first volume to its last, from such drawings. Hoefnagel drew images of many towns in France, Italy, England, and Spain.
He and his son Jacob subsequently created representations of Austrian and Hungarian towns for the Civitates. In addition to these overview plans, the atlas includes more detailed maps based on topographic surveys, particularly those of Jacob van Deventer (15??-1575). Accordingly, the maps show the systematic structure of the towns' layout, with perspective representations of various quarters and individual buildings.
The town usually appears in the background, while the foreground shows the surrounding countryside and detailed depictions of typical town inhabitants.
These visual representations of people not only augmented the maps' content but also served another purpose. Braun and Hogenberg illustrated the Civitates pages with figures of local inhabitants to prevent Turks from using the maps for military purposes, since Islam forbids images of humans.

Of the total number of towns, only a couple of dozen lie outside Europe, in Asia, Africa, and South America. This shows extremely limited cartographic knowledge of the world, due to the insufficient development of science and mapmaking practices in the second half of the sixth century. At the same time, one cannot help but be astonished by the huge quantity of material included in the atlas by the standards of the time.

Braun and Hogenberg's Civitates was an enormous success. It was republished many times and supplemented with new sections. Its maps became exemplary; other publishers frequently reproduced them in smaller formats as illustrations for books and maps.

After Franz Hogenberg's death, Abraham Hogenberg kept the atlas's typographic plates in Cologne. When Abraham died in 1653, his heirs evidently sold them to Johannes Janssonius, an active and skilled publisher of books and atlases in Amsterdam. In 1657, Janssonius issued the atlas in eight volumes in a completely revised edition, with illustrations arranged by country. A large number of quite new engravings were added to it, while outdated prints were omitted. After Janssonius's death in 1664, his grandson Johannes Janssonius van Waesberge acquired the engravings and used some to compile his own atlas, which appeared in 1682. In 1694, the energetic Amsterdam publisher Frederick de Wit purchased van Waesberge's copper plates and equipment at auction; he was well known for his numerous maps and atlases. De Wit organized a new edition, enriched with new engravings.

After de Wit's time, at the turn of the eighteenth century, the copper plates for the atlas passed to the publisher Pieter van der Aa (1659 - 1733). He acquired them in Leyden and used them for an atlas published in 1729. This publication included a diverse mixture of engravings from the sixteenth to eighteenth centuries.

After van der Aa, the publishing house of Covens and Mortier acquired town maps bearing the publisher's imprint of de Wit. Over the centuries, various publishers reproduced these 16th-century perspective views and maps because of their rich historical and geographical content. At the same time, no atlas of the world's cities in the history of global cartography matches the Civitates Orbis Terrarum in size and fullness.

Beyond its historical, geographical, and cartographic significance, the Civitates is also highly artistic. That is why, to this day, the atlas's town maps have adorned the most exquisite interiors and attracted not only specialists in the field but also admirers of fine art.