1522 PTOLEMY, C. / FRIES. L. - Third edition of "Géographie" by Ptolemy and published in Strasbourg

Third edition of "Géographie" by Ptolemy and published in Strasbourg. Illustrated with 50 woodcut maps.
One of the more important maps shows the earliest printed representation of China and Japan in a European Atlas.
The map draws on information from Marco Polo, including Tibet (Tibet), Cianba, Bangal (Bengal), Mangi (Manchu), Tangut, and Cathai (Cathay), shown in present-day Manchuria.
A conical-shaped Japan, taken from earlier outlines by Contarini and Waldseemüller, appears off the coast of China, with a note that its people are idolatrous and totally independent, not paying the customary tributes to the Chinese Emperor.
A wonderfully vivid vignette depicts the Kublai Khan seated in a tented encampment.

The atlas includes "Tabula Asia VI; an attractive woodblock map depicting the Caspian Sea, Black Sea, and the Persian Gulf, extending to the Imaus Mountains. According to Ptolemy. At the center of the map is modern-day Uzbekistan, with the prominent River Ox and the town of Bactra (Bakhara); the region is labeled SOGDIANA. Sogdiana is a historical region in present-day Uzbekistan, located in the basins of the Zerafshan and Kashkadarya rivers and along the Silk Road.

It shows the Black Sea and the Persian Gulf, extending to the Imaus Mountains.

The mountain ranges are depicted in the early Ptolemaic style, with wavy lines representing the sea.

The atlas follows the arrangement of Waldseemuller's edition, with the maps divided into two sections: the Ptolemaic maps, with the world map at the end, and then the series of modern maps. The Ptolemaic corpus is standard. The modern section is copied, in reduced form, from the maps prepared by Waldseemuller for the 1513 Strasbourg edition of Ptolemy, and accordingly contains the new maps of North America and the West Indies, Lorraine, Switzerland, Crete, North Africa, Southern Africa, Southern Asia, and the World.

To that group, Fries has added three maps: South East Asia and the East Indies, China and Japan, and a navigational map of the World. The two former are the first separate printed maps of the regions they depict.

Waldseemuller's edition has been termed "the first modern atlas, because the 20 new maps show all parts of the world based on contemporary knowledge. While one might disagree with that conclusion, the volume's context and arrangement remain Ptolemaic in concept; the new-map section proved very influential.

With some remarkable manuscript annotations. Ex-libris: "Ex bibliotheca sacerdotum missionis de Bello-Prato. Dono D. Cl. Henr. Richard, S.T.D. Parochi de Mesche. 1742".

In 1522, a third edition of Ptolemy's geography had been printed in Strasbourg by Johannes Grüninger. The maps prepared by L. Fries, are reduced versions of Martin Waldseemüller's maps of 1513; three new maps were compiled and cut for this printing. This edition includes several illustrations prepared for Waldseemüller's "Chronica mundi".

Reference: Pastoureau, Ptolémée C 1522 ; R. W. Karrow, Jr. , Mapmakers of the Sixteenth Century and Their Maps, 28/G.

Lorenz Fries (1490-1531)

Lorenz (Laurent) Fries was born in Alsace in 1490 or thereabouts, describing himself on one occasion as from Colmar. He studied medicine at university, or rather at universities, as he seems to have had a peripatetic education, apparently spending time at the universities of Pavia, Piacenza, Montpellier and Vienna. After completing his education, Fries established himself as a physician in a succession of places in the Alsace region and finally settled in Strasbourg around 1519. By this time, Fries met the Strasbourg printer and publisher Johann Grüninger, an associate of the St. Die group of scholars formed by, among others, Walter Lud, Martin Ringmann, and Martin Waldseemuller. Grüninger.

Fries and Grüninger's major project was a new edition of Claudius Ptolemy's Geographia, published by Johann Koberger in 1522. Here again, Fries evidently edited the maps, in most cases simply producing a reduction of the equivalent map from the 1513 edition of the Geographie Opus Novissima, printed by Johann Schott.
Fries also prepared three new maps for the Geographie: South-East Asia and the East Indies, China, and the World, but their geography derives from Waldseemüller's world map of 1507. Lorenz (Laurent) Fries was born in Alsace in c. 1490. He studied medicine at university and established himself as a physician in France before settling in Strasbourg in about 1519. There, Fries met the printer and publisher Johann Grüninger, an associate of the St. Die group of scholars formed by, among others, Martin Waldseemüller. For the next five years, from about 1520 to about 1525, Fries worked in some capacity as a cartographic editor for or with Grüninger, exploiting the material that Waldseemüller had created from Ptolemy. Unfortunately, there is little evidence to help gauge the exact nature of the relationship.

Fries' first venture into mapmaking was in 1520; that is the date found on a map of the World, bearing his monogram. The map reduced Waldseemüller's wall-map of the World, published in 1507. Fries and Grüninger's major project was a new edition of Ptolemy's Geographia, first published in 1522. Fries evidently edited the maps, in most cases simply reducing the equivalent maps from the 1513 edition of the Geographie Opus Novissima. Fries also prepared three new maps for the Geographia: South-East Asia and the East Indies, China, and the World, but their geography derives from Waldseemüller's 1507 world map.

In 1525, Fries was forced to move on as he had exhausted the existing body of Waldseemüller's works. For whatever reason, his departure marked the end of his cartographic work, and he returned to writing medical textbooks, which occupied him until his death in 1531 or 1532. The 1535 and 1541 editions of Fries’ Geographia are printed posthumously. Karrow noted "Grüninger had high hopes for this edition, one of the grandest products of his press in a period when it was not known for producing grand books. The edition suffered, however, from a great many textual errors.
Nevertheless, the book sold well enough to justify a new edition three years later..."
Instead, it would appear that Grüninger sought to recoup his investment by preparing an improved edition. To this end, he sought the assistance of Wilibald Pirkheimer to re-edit the text, using the notes of Johannes Regiomontanus.
The new edition was ready in 1525. As Karrow notes, the press-work was not of a high standard, and Pirckheimer was generally dissatisfied with the finished book.

After Grüninger died in 1531, the business was continued by his son Christoph, who seems to have sold the materials for the Ptolemy to two Lyons publishers, the brothers Melchior and Gaspar Trechsel, who published a joint edition in 1535, before Gaspar Trechsel published an edition in his own right in 1541.

Michael Servetus
Moving to Lyon under the name Villanovanus, Servetus edited scientific works and published a translation of Ptolemy’s Geographia. About 1534, a rendezvous was arranged with John Calvin in Paris to discuss theological questions, but Servetus failed to arrive.

Servetus and Calvin Two editions of Laurent Fries' atlas were edited by Michael Servetus. In those difficult times, Servetus was accused of heresy. One piece of evidence used against him was a passage on the reverse of the modern map of the Holy Land, which said that "Palestine was not such a fertile land as was generally believed, since modern travelers reported it barren". Unfortunately, this was not Servetus' original view, but was a passage repeated from the 1522 edition.
This charge seems to have counted against Servetus for, when he was burnt at the stake, Calvin ordered that copies of the book should be burnt with him.
Fortunately, it seems that Calvinist authorities may only have burnt a few token copies!