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Edutainment > Articles on Art > Historical Maps > Abraham Ortelius - 1528-1598

Historical map of Northern Africa

Abraham Ortel, better known with the name Abraham Ortelius, published the first world atlas, the Theatrum Orbis Terrarum. It was a huge success.

Abraham Ortelius from Antwerp

Abraham Ortelius was born in Antwerp. Ortelius was the Latin version of his real Dutch name Ortel. Ortelius, respectively Ortel had studied Greek, Latin and mathematics. He established himself in Antwerp as a book and map dealer and cartographer. He became famous with a very successful world atlas, the Theatrum Orbis Terrarum. This was probably the first collection of maps in book form twenty years before Mercator published his atlas. In 1570, when the first edition of the Theatrum Orbis Terrarum was published, the word atlas was not in use yet. The engraver was Frans Hogenberg.

The Theatrum Orbis Terrarum was so successful that it had to be reprinted four times in its first year of publication. Altogether the atlas was published in 42 editions from 1570 to 1612 and in 7 languages - Latin, German, Dutch, French, Spanish, English and Italian. A tremendous success for a cartographer in the 16th century! Ortelius was also the first to note the reference sources for his maps by mentioning other cartographers. Map publishing was basically a copy cat business in those days.

The later editions after 1598 were published by Jan Baptiste Vrients. He had bought the publication rights by the heirs of Ortelius.

Literature Source

• "Carl Moreland and David Bannister: Antique Maps, Phaidon Press Limited, ISBN 0-7148 2954 4

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