Von Erfindung derselben durch underschiedliche Schiffart. 545

Title

Von Erfindung derselben durch underschiedliche Schiffart. 545

Description

Illustration shows the presentation of peace gifts from King Powhatan to Captain Argoll in Virginia. Front and back with German description.

ca. 1628

Artist

Bry, de - Merian (1528-1598)

In 1631, Matthäus Merian and Johann Ludwig Gottfried published a one-volume abridged version of the monumental America series by Theodor De Bry and his two sons. The Historia Antipodum can be seen as the apotheosis of the collection of voyages to the New World. After Theodor's death in 1598, Johan Theodor and his brother Johan Israel continued to run the business together in Frankfurt until the latter died in 1609. As he had no natural male successor, in 1616 he sought the help of a highly talented Basel engraver in his early twenties, Matthäus Merian the Elder (1593-1650), who soon married Johan Theodor's eldest daughter Maria Magdalena. When Johan Theodor died, Merian immediately complied with a request from his mother-in-law. After Merian moved to Frankfurt permanently in June 1626, he turned to Johann Ludwig Gottfried (ca. 1584-1633) to help him pursue a successful independent career as a publisher. In the early 1630s, Gottfried contributed to a new Latin edition of Part 3, which contained the reports of Hans Staden and Jean de Léry on Brazil, as well as to German and Latin reprints of Part 9, which was dedicated to the natural history of the West Indies by the Jesuit José de Acosta. He was probably also involved in the production of the last German volume of the America series, part 14, which was published in 1630. The most significant addition to the collection, however, was a German work entitled Historia Antipodum or Newe Welt, published in 1631, a voluminous folio volume of more than six hundred pages which, despite its size, brought together what was probably the most monumental publication of early modern Europe, the fourteen-part America series that formed part of the De Bry travel collection. In many ways, the changes Merian and Gottfried made to the travelogues for Historia Antipodum surpassed even the editorial changes made for the original volumes. The travel accounts were no longer published one after the other, each followed by its own set of relevant illustrations, but all available information was summarized in three long chapters on the history of the New World, with the engravings within the text rather than as separate sections at the end of each narrative. The first chapter of the abridged version deals with the natural world, a decision that must be seen in the light of Gottfried and Merian's personal convictions, which they expressed in their introduction to Archontologia Cos- mica. The second chapter brings together fifty-three travelogues to the New World, all of which were previously included in the collection of voyages. Finally, the third and shortest chapter presents new, recently published accounts of European expansion in the Atlantic. In the introduction to the volume, the editors introduce the reader to their objective. The dedication to Landgrave Philipp von Hessen, signed only by Merian but dated 1630, emphasizes the differences between Europeans and the indigenous population of the New World, as does the "Preface to the Reader", which bears both signatures. Merian and Gottfried adhere to the generally accepted order of information in early modern European humanities and open their Historia Antipodum with a description of the natural world. The first seventy pages are based on the German translation of Acosta's treatise, which was first used in 1601. As the original translation prepared by Johan Homberger for the De Brys comprised 327 folios, the version printed in the abridged edition was heavily edited. Books 1-3 of Acosta's work, which deal with such traditional and far-reaching topics as the Aristotelian world view, the biblical theories on the origin of the Indians, the habitability of the Torrid zone and the currents and winds in the southern hemisphere, are each reduced to a few pages in the Historia Antipodum.

Historical Description

Virginia received its name in honor of Queen Elizabeth I of England from Walter Raleigh during his expedition in 1584, when he founded the first settlement on Roanoke Island.Of the native peoples of Virginia, the best known are the Powhatan belonging to the Virginia Algonkin who lived near the coast. Other groups included Nottaway and Meherrin, members of the Iroquois family, southwest of them, Monacan and Saponi, members of the Sioux family, who lived in the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains, and Cherokee in the far west of the state. The first attempts at settlement by the English took place in Virginia. However, these first attempts were not made by the English government, but by a company called the Virginia Company, which founded the Jamestown settlement in 1607. At that time the English government lacked the money to finance such expensive and unsafe expeditions. Initially, the attempts to colonize were only moderately successful. During the English Powhatan Wars, the colony came under severe pressure. The year 1612 was an economically very important year. John Rolfe planted the first tobacco plant, which he had probably brought from Trinidad, in Virginia. Due to the hot and humid climate and the help of the indigenous population, the tobacco plants thrive splendidly. Rolfe, who had married an indigenous woman named Pocahontas in 1614, made his way to England in 1616 with the first batch of tobacco, where he was a resounding success. In 1617 he returned to Virginia to continue growing tobacco, but without Pocahontas, who had died in England. Rolfe had triggered the first boom in the new English world. As the home of many founding fathers, particularly Patrick Henry, Thomas Jefferson, Richard Henry Lee, James Madison, George Mason and George Washington, Virginia played a prominent role in the American independence movement.