’ and later his ‘Cosmographia’ of 1544 dominated the cartographic landscape of Northern Europe into the 1570s. It reshaped how other publishers and mapmakers thought about constructing an atlas. In Italy, the format pioneered by Münster was taken up by Giacomo Gastaldi, in his ‘La Geografia di Claudio Ptolemeo’ (1548), which acknowledges Münster in the long title, and Ruscelli. In the Low Countries, the atlases of 

’s 1540 edition contains Claudius Ptolemy’s text translated by Willibald Pirckheimer and revised by Michael Servetus. Münster redesigned the maps and added an appendix. The maps are particularly famous for their decorative elements highlighted by Ferdinand Magellan’s ship the ‘Victoria’, the ‘monoculi’ (or cyclops) on the map of Africa, the shipwreck of Saint Paul on the second map of Africa, the drawing of the elephant on the map of Ceylon, and others. Although it is not known who was responsible for the woodcuts, the borders on the verso text on some of the maps have been attributed to Hans Holbein; two are signed with Adam Petri's monogram. There are forty-eight maps in total: twenty-seven ancient Ptolemaic maps, and twenty-one ‘modern’ maps. This very rare first edition contains full original hand colour.

Of the forty-eight maps included in this volume, one is especially notable. Coming half a century after Columbus’s initial landfall in the Caribbean, Münster’s map of America is the first separate printed map of the Western Hemisphere. Cuba, Hispaniola, and Jamaica are all shown with the Florida Peninsula (‘Terra Florida’) to the north. Beyond this Quebec and Greenland are merged into a single landmass (‘Francisca’). The southern continent is referred to as ‘America’ with few other details. The mouth of the Amazon is represented by a large inlet. Spanish and Portuguese standards are placed in the Atlantic Ocean representing territorial claims agreed upon in the Papal Treaty of Tordesillas (1494). 

To the west, Münster represents the Pacific Ocean, labelled ‘Mare Pacificum’, only the second time this name had been used on a map (see SC-TM-1532-Munster-WorldMap) since Magellan’s circumnavigation. Zipangri (Japan), still known only from Marco Polo (who had heard tales of it but had never been there), appears as a very large, north-south oriented rectangular island off the west coast of North America. Marco Polo was also the source for Münster’s belief in the complex of 7,448 islands situated between Japan and the Asian mainland, which is, interestingly, the first use of a numerical statistic on a map. It is likely that these islands were the Philippines. By Münster’s time, direct European contact with the Philippines had been made, both by Magellan, who died there, and almost certainly by eastward-bound Portuguese explorers before him. Münster, on his map of Asia, has included the real Philippine Island of Pulane.

 (1488–1552) was a cosmographer and professor of Hebrew who taught at Tübingen, Heidelberg, and Basel. After converting to Protestantism in 1529, he took over the chair of Hebrew at the University of Basel, where he published a two-volume Old Testament in Hebrew with a Latin translation. In Basel, Münster made himself the centre of a large network of scholars from whom he obtained geographic descriptions, maps, and directions. He remained in Basel until his death in 1552. 

Münster published his first known map, a map of Germany, in 1525. Three years later, he released a treatise on sundials. In 1540, he published ‘

 Universalis Vetus et Nova’, an updated edition of Claudius Ptolemy’s ‘

’. In addition to the Ptolemaic maps, Münster added twenty-one modern maps that would influence Ortelius and other early atlas makers. The ‘

’ established the convention of including both world and continental maps and was the first printed work to render latitude and longitude in their now-standard degree-minute-second form. It also included the first printed map of the Western Hemisphere, the first set of maps of the four continents, and the first printed map to name the Pacific Ocean.

' established the convention that a universal atlas should include world and continental maps and was the first printed work to render latitude and longitude in their now-standard form. It also includes the first printed map of the Western Hemisphere, the first set of maps of the four continents, and the first printed map to name the Pacific Ocean.

Although it is not known who was responsible for the woodcut maps themselves, the decorative borders have been attributed to Hans Holbein. Indeed, Münster’s maps are particularly famous for their decorative elements. There are forty-eight of them in total: twenty-seven ancient Ptolemaic maps, and twenty-one ‘modern’ maps. This very rare first edition contains full original hand colour.

World map with wind heads on an oval projection

Armillary sphere 

Map projection 

World map on Ptolemy's second projection

Ptolemaic map of Great Britain

Ptolemaic map of  Spain

Ptolemaic map of France (Gaul)

Ptolemaic map of Germany

Ptolemaic map of modern Slovenia and part of Italy

Ptolemaic map of Italy

Ptolemaic map of the Balkans including Romania, Bulgaria, and Macedonia

Ptolemaic map of Greece including Macedonia, Crete and Cyprus 

Ptolemaic map of Northwest Africa, the Balearic Islands and the Western tip of the Mediterranean 

Ptolemaic map of the North of Central Africa including Libya, Tunisia and the Mediterranean

Ptolemaic map of Egypt

Ptolemaic map of Ethiopia, Libya, and Egypt

Ptolemaic map of Turkey and Cyprus 

Ptolemaic map of Samartia (Black Sea region)

Ptolemaic map of the Caspian Sea including Armenia, Turkey, and Georgia 

Ptolemaic map of Palestine, Syria, and Cyprus

Ptolemaic map of modern Iran 

Ptolemaic map of modern Saudi Arabia, Yemen, and Oman

Ptolemaic map of modern Russia, Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan 

Ptolemaic map of modern Pakistan and Afghanistan 

Ptolemaic map of modern India 

Ptolemaic map of Southeast Asia

Ptolemaic map of modern Taprobana (modern Sri Lanka) 

New map of Europe

New map of England 

New map of Spain

New map of Gaul

New map of Switzerland

New map of Germany 

Alsace and Brisgow, France

Map of the Rhine

Map of the Rhine 9

Barbarian, map 5 of the Rhine

Swabians and Barbarians

Map of Franconian region

Map of Scandinavia 

Map of Poland

Map of Italy

Map of the Holy Land

Map of the New World

Map of Africa

Map of Asia

Map of Lake Constance

A fine example, in full original hand-colour, of the rare first edition of one of the most important and rarest atlases of the sixteenth century.

Quarto, 19th-century blind-tooled calf to style, with metal clasps, lacking leather straps.

48 double-page woodcut maps (27 ancient maps and 21 ‘modern’), in full original colour.

Universal Geography, old and new, including the eight books of the writings of Claudius Ptolemy of Alexandria

Geographia Universalis, Vetus et Nova, Complectens Claudii Ptolemaei Alexandrini Enarrationis Libros VIII.

Claudius Ptolemy; Willibald Pirckheimer; Michael Villanovus, Michael Servetus

Münster's Pioneering 'Geographia' 
