Erdfurt die hauptstatt in Thüringen contrafhetet nach ausserlichem ansehen / aber nit in grund gelegt.

Title

Erdfurt die hauptstatt in Thüringen contrafhetet nach ausserlichem ansehen / aber nit in grund gelegt.

Description

View of the state capital Erfurt in the Free State of Thuringia with the Erfurt Cathedral, the Severikirche and two coats of arms.

ca. 1550

Artist

Münster (1489-1552)

Sebastian Münsters (1489-1552) is one of the famous cosmographers of the Renaissance. Its real importance in the field of cartography is based on its famous cosmography, which he published in 1544 with 24 double-sided maps (including Moscow and Transylvania). The material for this came largely from research and the collection of information from around 1528, which he initially only wanted to use for a description of Germany, but was now sufficient for a map of the entire world and ultimately led to a cosmography. He constantly tried to improve this work, i.e. to replace or add to maps. In the edition of 1550, only 14 maps were taken over from the earlier editions. The 52 maps printed in the text were also only partially based on the old maps. The great success of this cosmography was also based on the precise work of the woodcuts mostly by Hans Holbein the Younger, Urs Graf, Hans Rudolph Deutsch and David Kandel. It was the first scientific and at the same time generally understandable description of the knowledge of the world in German, in which the basics of history and geography, astronomy and natural sciences, regional and folklore were summarized according to the state of knowledge at that time. Cosmography is the science of describing the earth and the universe. Until the late Middle Ages, geography, geology and astronomy were also part of it. The first edition of the Cosmographia took place in 1544 in German, printed in Heinrich Petri's office in Basel. Heinrich Petri was a son from the first marriage of Münster's wife to the Basel printer Adam Petri. Over half of all editions up to 1628 were also published in German. However, the work has also been published in Latin, French, Czech and Italian. The English editions all comprised only a part of the complete work. Viktor Hantzsch identified a total of 46 editions in 1898 (German 27; Latin 8; French 3; Italian 3; Czech 1) that appeared from 1544 to 1650, while Karl Heinz Burmeister only had 36 (German 21; Latin 5; French 6; Italian 3; Czech 1) that appeared between 1544 and 1628. The first edition from 1544 was followed by the second edition in 1545, the third in 1546, the fourth edition in 1548 and the fifth edition in 1550, each supplemented by new reports and details, text images, city views and maps and revised altogether. Little has been known about who - apart from the book printers Heinrich Petri and Sebastian Henricpetri - were responsible for the new editions after Münster's death. The 1628 edition was edited and expanded by the Basel theologian Wolfgang Meyer. With Cosmographia, Sebastian Münster has published for the first time a joint work by learned historians and artists, by publishers, wood cutters and engravers. The numerous vedute are usually made as woodcuts. Sebastian Münster obtained his knowledge from the travel reports and stories of various scholars, geographers, cartographers and sea travelers. Long after his death, "Kosmographie" was still a popular work with large editions: 27 German, 8 Latin, 3 French, 4 English and even 1 Czech editions appeared. The last edition appeared in Basel in 1650.

Historical Description

Named after the Thuringii tribe who occupied it around AD 300, Thuringia came under Frankish domination in the 6th century. The Thuringian tribe formed during the Migration Period. The Saxon Otonen and the Sangerhausen became a center of the Holy Roman Empire in the 10th century. A separate Duchy of Thuringia cannot develop in this way. Greatest power in the Thuringian war at that time was the county of Weimar. It was only the Ludowinger rights that brought parts of Thuringia under their control. In the 12th century, the process of expanding the state in Thuringia was secured. It is called the first climbed cities such as Mühlhausen. The important noble families of medieval Thuringia were next to the dominant Wettin and the Ludowingern. In 1485, with the division of Leipzig, the wet lands were sold to the Albertiner rights in the east and the Ernestiner administration in the west. With the Reformation at the beginning of the 16th century, Thuringia became the center of German politics. Martin Luther made announcements of responsibility at the University of Erfurt and in the Augustinian monastery before he went to Wittenberg and the Reformation began. In 1640, two main Ernestine lines emerged: the House of Saxony-Weimar and the House of Saxony-Gotha. Subsequently, the phase of humanism began in Thuringia, in which the University of Erfurt also had a heyday. A center of German humanism was formed around Ulrich von Hutten and the reformers. It was only around 1780 that the ruling Duchess Anna Amalia and her son Karl August left the region again. They called poets such as Johann Wolfgang von Goethe or Friedrich Schiller and their court, where they established Weimar Classicism as a German version of the classic literary movement. In 1833, the Customs and Trade Association of the Thuringian States was founded, which spurred industrial revolution in the country. As a result of industrialization, Thuringia became the cradle of social democracy. 1869 Greater August Bebel and Wilhelm Liebknecht in Eisenach the Social Democratic Workers 'Party, in 1875 merged with the General German Workers' Association in Gotha to form the SPD. The Gotha program and the Erfurt program subsequently defined the goals of social democratic politics in Germany.