Geometrischer grundriß Der Statt und Schloß Cazal.

Title

Geometrischer grundriß Der Statt und Schloß Cazal.

Description

Ground plan of the town of Casale Monferrato on the right bank of the Po in the Piedmont region, Italy.

ca. 1650

Artist

Merian (1593-1650)

Matthäus Merian (1593 – 1650) , born in Basel, learned the art of copperplate engraving in Zurich and subsequently worked and studied in Strasbourg, Nancy, and Paris, before returning to Basel in 1615. The following year he moved to Frankfurt, Germany where he worked for the publisher Johann Theodor de Bry. He married his daughter, Maria Magdalena 1617. In 1620 they moved back to Basel, only to return three years later to Frankfurt, where Merian took over the publishing house of his father-in-law after de Bry's death in 1623. In 1626 he became a citizen of Frankfurt and could henceforth work as an independent publisher. He is the father of Maria Sibylla Merian, who later published her the famous and wellknown studies of flowers, insects and butterflies.

Historical Description

Casale Monferrato: The bishop of Asti, Sant'Evasio, named the small village Casale (after the Italian word for country house). The first written mention of the name dates back to 988. After Charlemagne donated the village to the Church of Vercelli, it regained its freedom under the rule of Frederick Barbarossa. In 1215 it was successively sacked by the troops of Vercelli, Alessandria and Milan, then rebuilt and fortified five years later. From 1305 it was dominated by the Palaiologi, and in 1474 the settlement obtained the status of town. As a result of the treaty concluded between France and Spain in 1559, within the framework of the Peace of Cateau-Cambrésis, the town came under the rule of the Gonzaga family from Mantua, who made Casale a fortress. During the War of the Mantuan Succession (1629-1631), French troops entered Casale; Spanish troops besieged the town and the fortress in 1629 and 1630. In the War of the Spanish Succession, Duke Ferdinando Carlo of Gonzaga-Nevers sided with France; Emperor Joseph I then declared treason against the Empire, confiscated the part of the Duchy of Montferrat that remained with the House of Gonzaga, including Casale, in 1708, and transferred it to the House of Savoy in 1713.