Münster, Sebastian

Cosmographiae uniuersalis Lib. VI in quibus, iuxta certioris fidei scriptorum traditionem describuntur, Omniu[m] habitabilis orbis partiu[m] situs, p[ro]priæq[ue] dotes. Regionum Topographicæ effigies. Terræ ingenia, quibus fit ut tam differe[n]tes & uarias specíe res, & animatas, & inanímatas, ferat. Animalium peregrinorum naturæ & picturæ. Nobiliorum ciuitatum icones & descriptiones. Regnorum initia, incrementa & translationes. Omnium gentiu[m] mores, leges, religio, res gestæ, mutationes: Item regum & principium genealogiæ. Autore Sebast. Munstero

Colophon: Basel: Heinrich Petri, March 1550. First Latin edition.

Folio in 8s (12 15/16” x 8 1/8”, 312mm x 207mm): π⁶ 1-14² a-e⁸ f² g⁴ h-k⁶ l⁸ m-n² o⁶ p⁸ q-r⁴ s-z⁸ A-B⁸ C⁶ D² E⁸ F⁶ G⁴ H² I⁴ K² L⁴ M² N-O⁸ P⁶ Q-R² S⁴ T-V² X⁴ Y⁸ Z⁶ Aa-Bb² Cc⁸ Dd² Ee-Gg⁸ Hh⁴ Ii⁸ Kk⁶ Ll² Mm⁶ Nn-Oo⁸ Pp⁴ Qq² Rr⁴ Ss² Tt⁸ Vu⁶ Xx⁴ Yy² Zz⁸ AA-BB² CC⁸ DD⁴ EE-FF⁸ GG⁴ HH-KK⁸ LL⁴ MM-QQ⁸ RR⁴ SS-ZZ⁸ Aaa-Fff⁸ Ggg⁶ Hhh⁸ *⁶ [8s $5 signed; –π1, Tt4; Y3 mis-signed as “Y”, Y6 mis-signed as “Y5”, Ff4 mis-signed as “Ff”, Mm5 mis-signed as “Mm4”, Tt6 mis-signed “Tt3”, Tt7 mis-signed “Tt3”]. 632 leaves, pp. [12] (title, portrait, 9pp. dedication to Charles V, list of sources), [56] (14 double-page wood-cut maps with text to the recto of each first leaf), 1-474, [4] (text, 2pp. view of Speyer, text), 475-480, [8] (text, 2pp. view of Worms, 2 blanks, 2pp. view of Worms, blank), 481-617, 2 blanks, ₂617-618, blank, 619-683, 2 blanks, ₂683-684, blank, 685-1162, [14] (errata with colophon, printer’s device, 12pp. index). [=xii, 56, 1182, xiv] With 54 wood-cut maps and views, of which 51 are double-page and 3 (Worms at Y3, Heidelberg at Mm2 and Vienna from Tt3) intended to be folding but bound as two double-page wood-cut views each.

Bound in later (XVIIc?) speckled calf. On the spine, five raised bands. Title (“COSMOGR/ VNIVERSA”) gilt to the second panel. Gilt roll to the edges of the boards. All edges of the text-block speckled red.

Front hinge split and partly perished, lacking the head- and tail-pieces. Wear to the extremities, with a 4” loss to the front cover at the fore-edge. Rubbed generally. Damp-stain, mostly mild but occasionally heavier, throughout, and generally marginal. An old repair to the map of Europa (3₁^r). Double-page map of Paris (g2.3, pp. 87-90) renewed with some loss. Map of Rome (quire n, pp. 149-152) with a split at the mount. Closed tears to several leaves, mostly marginal. Worming to the lower margin Ccc3-Ddd4 (pp. 1077-1096). Spot-offsetting to O1-O5 and Qq1-Rr3. Ink marginalia to o4^r (p. 159, view of Venice: “Mar”), o5^r (p. 161: “Mediolanens[is]), HH1^r (p. 801, striking through “& Hieronymus” Hus: “et Hieronimus de Praga”) and Fff5^v (p. 1130: “Arsine”). Graphite marginalia to Y2^r (p. 479: tracing the final S and A from Y3^r in “CIVITAS/WORMA”). Ink ownership signature of “Brevoy” (Brevoye? Brevon?) to the front paste-down and to the title-page. Ink ownership signature of “hornot 1755” (or 1799?) to the recto of the first free end-paper. Pasted armorial plate of the Abbaye de ND d’Issoudon (struck through in ink) to the title-page, obscuring the “OSM” of “COSMO”(/GRAPHIAE). Ink ownership signature of “Deshayes/1687” to a1^r (p. 1, with offsetting to 14₂^v, the blank of the map of the Americas). An utterly unsophisticated example.


Sebastian Münster (1488–1552) was a cartographer and Hebraist — though in fact he was a true polymath and humanist. He published on language and mathematics, astronomy and cartography, and was one of the great biblical exegetes. Indeed, such is his intellectual legacy that his was the face on the 100 Deutsche Mark note used in West Germany 1962–1991.

Münster’s legacy is due most of all to his Cosmographia — of which this is the first Latin edition and, with the German edition of the same year, the first illustrated edition — which is in some senses an atlas, but more truly an encyclopedia. Its ambit is the world, its span all of human history. To descriptions of various nations or regions Münster adds sections on the tools of navigation and surveying, the histories of empires and even religious heterodoxy: the “Prester John letter” in both Latin and Hebrew, describing the mythical Christian realm in the East. The maps and woodcuts (some by Hans Holbein the Younger; CCC6^v, p. 1086, shows Albrecht Dürer’s rhinoceros adapted by David Kandel) are among the most important of the XVIc, including the earliest depiction of the Americas as discrete continents. The two world maps — the first, also by Kandel, being published for the first time in this edition, showing the New World; the second is the earlier Ptolemaic map that shows Europe, Africa and Asia only — stand at the forefront of the rapidly-shifting view of the world as explorers returned to Europe.

The 1550 edition, long the most sought-after of all the many translations and editions of the Cosmographia, often has a long pattern of provenance; the present item is no exception. The earliest owner (or reader) did not leave his name but only his emendation to p. 801: correcting a marginal note referring to the Czech theologian conflating Jan Hus and Jerome of Prague (“Comburuntur Ioannes & Hieronymus Hus” corrected to “Comburuntur Ioannes Hus et Hieronimus de Praga”: Jan Hus and Jerome of Prague were burnt), one of Hus’s major disciples. The hand is XVIc, though its nationality is difficult to assess, and the correction points to a theologically-trained (perhaps even Czech) reader.

For many centuries, the book circulated through French collections (although the manuscript “Mar” and “Mediolanens[is]” to pp. 159 and 161, in the same blunt hand, point to an Italian or Spanish reader). The “Deshayes” who signed the first page of the text in 1687 (and closed the book too quickly thereafter) is unknown. One thinks of Jean Deshayes (d. 1706), the noted hydrographer-cartographer who moved to Canada in 1685 (difficult for our date) and who amassed a vast library.

The Abbey of Our Lady of Issoudun is a Benedictine community in the diocese of Bourges in central France. (Issoudun is the home of the worship of Our Lady of the Sacred Heart.) The abbey was founded in the XIc and continued to operate more or less until the French Revolution. The striking through of its name — only fair given that the librarian obscured part of the printed title when placing their cut-out armorial plate, which is perhaps XVIIc in design — suggests that one of the other named owners came to own it afterwards.

The XVIIIc signature (it is unclear whether dated 1755 or 1799; the former seems likelier) of Hornot immediately brings to mind the multivalent Antoine Hornot, the Burgundy-born chronicler and amasser of potted histories of various subjects: distillation, smells, America and, as translator and additional author the 1757 Abbregé chronologique de l’histoire universelle — for which the present volume would doubtless have been useful.

The signature of Brevo(y?) to the front paste-down and to the title-page is the most mysterious. In style it appears to be XVIIIc, but the name yields little insight.

Purchased at the Christie’s New York sale of Henri Burton (22 April 1994, lot 46), noting that the volume came from the collection of Frederick Hastings Rindge (1857–1905). Rindge was the heir to a major banking fortune who, during his time at Harvard, traveled extensively through Europe — perhaps buying the volume — and then came to donate the land on which the Cambridge (Massachusetts) public library was built. Rindge and his wife bought the Rancho Topanga Malibu Sequit in 1891, from which Malibu and Topanga in Los Angeles County were carved. Burton (1896–1968) was “a Lyon native who amassed a collection with great taste and discretion over four decades,” with a particularly strong collection of early Continental books.

Adams M1908; Burmeister 89; Sabin 51379; Shirley 92 (world map); VD16 M 6714 (lacking the 12pp. index *⁶).

Item #JLR0446

Price: $28,000