Von stetten Mauritanie. / von den Löwen und ihrer natur.

Title

Von stetten Mauritanie. / von den Löwen und ihrer natur.

The front shows one of the four cities of Mauritania. .Jol, Cirta, Arsenaria, Catenna. Above are the columns of Heracles. The back shows a lion in Africa.

ca. 1550

Artist

Münster (1489-1552)

Sebastian Münster (1489–1552) was a leading Renaissance cosmographer. His most famous work, the Cosmographia (1544), was a comprehensive description of the world with 24 maps, based on research dating back to 1528. Continuously revised, the 1550 edition already included many new maps. It was the first scientific yet accessible world description published in German, illustrated with numerous woodcuts by artists such as Hans Holbein the Younger. Between 1544 and 1650, the Cosmographia appeared in 46 editions (27 in German) and was translated into several languages. Münster’s work combined the knowledge of scholars, artists, and travelers and remained influential long after his death.

Historical Description

From the late 19th century, France claimed the areas of what is now Mauretania from Senegal to the north. In 1901, Xavier Coppolani took over the imperial mission. Through a combination of strategic alliances with Zawaya tribes and military pressure on the Hassane warrior nomads, he managed to expand French rule over the Mauritanian Emirates. Trarza, Brakna and Tagant were occupied by the French armies in 1903–04, but the northern Emirate of Adrar held out longer, aided by the anti-colonial uprising (or jihad) by Shaykh Maa al-Aynayn and insurgents from Tagant and the other regions. Adrar was finally defeated militarily in 1912 and incorporated into the Mauritanian territory, which had been created and planned in 1904. Mauritania belonged to French West Africa from 1920 as a protectorate and then as a colony.