The first rarer woodblock of two that Sebastian Münster (1488-1552) produced of the modern world. A second was published in 1550 as a replacement which is most readily identified by the initials of David Kandel lower right (‘DK’). A very ornate oval map with extensive imagery of clouds and windheads surrounding it. The typography is set within the block. The depiction of the Americas is of particular interest. North America includes the illusion of a ready passage to Asia in the region of present-day Carolina. The ‘Terra nova sive de Bacalhos’ (New land of Cod) extends across the Atlantic to form a land bridge with Scandinavia. The Straits of Magellan separate a large land mass to the south, and the tip of Africa clearly illustrates easy access to Asia where an early depiction of Zipangri (Japan) is placed.

Munster is a renowned geographer, cosmographer, mathematician, and humanist. He studied Hebrew at Heidelberg and became a professor at Basle University specialising in Semitic languages. Whilst there he began lectures on mathematics and cosmography. In 1540 Münster published his own edition of Ptolemy’s ‘Geographia’. The ‘Cosmographia’, his most renowned work, was first published by Henri Petri in 1544 in German. This encyclopaedic work is the first scientific compendium of the knowledge of the day including astronomy, geography, history, and natural sciences. It consists of six books the first of which describes geography and astronomy using many illustrations. The remaining books describe the regions of the world: Southern and Western Europe, Germany, Northern and Eastern Europe, Asia and Africa. The first editions were all in German and published in 1544, 1546, 1548 and 1550. This example is from an edition of the ‘Cosmography’ published just before his death in 1552. The woodcut decoration on the verso is the work of Hans Holbein (d.1543), the great portrait artist and printmaker. Provenance: Clive A. Burden Ltd. Karrow (1993) 58/73; Shirley (1991) 77.