Obern Baden/Statt Baeder/nach ihrer Gelegenheit auff das allerfleissigest contasehtet

Title

Obern Baden/Statt Baeder/nach ihrer Gelegenheit auff das allerfleissigest contasehtet

Description

Half-bird show of the city of Baden in the canton of Aargau in Switzerland with city coat of arms carried by two angels.

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 Limmat valley was already settled during the Mesolithic period. In 14 AD, the Romans built the Vindonissa legionary camp about five kilometers west of Baden, on the municipal territory of Windisch. The Roman legionaries recognized the healing properties of the thermal water and built thermal baths at the bend of the Limmat River, attested in inscriptions as Aquae Helveticae. Alamannic graves from the 7th century indicate that the area was continuously settled after the final withdrawal of the Romans in the first decade of the 5th century. Before the turn of the millennium, Stein Castle was built on the rocky ridge of the Schlossberg. Before 1127 there was a division of the Lenzburg dominion; the descendants of Arnold II. (1070-1127) called themselves the Counts of Baden. The Baden line died out in 1172. About 800 meters north of the main settlement was a second settlement center around the thermal springs, with the "Great Baths" on the left bank and the "Small Baths" on the right bank of the river. Around 1250, Baden developed into its own high court district. Even in Habsburg times, Baden had been a popular place of negotiation because of the baths and the associated diversions. In 1512, the city of Baden received a valuable Julius banner from Pope Julius II specifically because of the successful expulsion of the French. In 1529, latent tensions led to the First Kappeler War, which ended without a fight. In the Second Kappeler War of 1531, the Catholic towns prevented the further spread of the Reformation. According to the Second Land Peace, several parishes around Baden and the Wettingen Monastery were recatholicized. Baden remained a popular destination for secular and ecclesiastical dignitaries of both confessions.