Moscovia

Title

Moscovia

Description

Map shows the area of Moscow.

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

The Eastern European Plain occupies most of European Russia. It consists of wide lowlands interrupted by weakly indented ridges. Only a few elevations reach heights of more than 300 m. In Karelia and on the Kola Peninsula, which geologically belong to the Baltic Shield, the relief is more differentiated in the north. There, in the Chibines of the central Kola Peninsula, a maximum height of 1191 m is reached. In the south, the East European lowlands merge into the Caspian depression, which lies below sea level. During the last ice age a chain of terminal moraines was formed, which runs from the border area with Belarus eastward and north of Moscow to the Arctic coast west of the Pechora River. The region north of it consists of many lakes and swamps. The European part of the territory is much more densely populated and urbanized than the Asian part, which is over three times larger. The capital, Moscow, is one of the largest cities and metropolitan areas in the world. The second most important center is Saint Petersburg, which was the capital from 1712 to 1918 and is today an important cultural center. The next largest cities with over a million inhabitants are Novosibirsk, Yekaterinburg, Kazan and Nizhny Novgorod. In the European part of Russia, the most important river is the Volga. It is the longest river in Europe and runs exclusively through Russia. Together with its two tributaries Kama and Oka, it drains a large part of the East European Plain after 3534 km to the Caspian Sea in the southeast. As a waterway, the Volga has special significance, as it connects Eastern Europe with Central Asia.