S. Maurise in Wallis / S. Mauritius in Valesia.

Title

S. Maurise in Wallis / S. Mauritius in Valesia.

Description

View shows the city of Saint-Maurice located in the canton of Valais in Switzerland.

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

Saint-Maurice was first the Celtic village of Acauno, which attracted the attention of the Romans because of its strategic position at the entrance to the upper Rhône valley. After the conquest, they established a military post and a customs station there to collect taxes from the merchants between Italy and Gaul, because the place was located on one of the great trade routes that led from Italy to Germania and Gaul over the Mont-Joux Pass. In 515, King Sigismund of Burgundy commissioned monks to build a monastery here. This date is considered the foundation of the Abbey of Saint-Maurice, which can thus be considered one of the oldest abbeys in Switzerland.