Celestial chart 1750

Matthias Seutter

PaperPrint
48 ⨯ 57 cm
€ 1.950

Inter-Antiquariaat Mefferdt & De Jonge

• About the artwork
  Planisphaerium Coeleste. Copper engraving published by Matthäus Seutter in Nuremberg around 1750. Coloured by a leter hand. Size: 48 x 57 cm. This chart shows us the stars of the Northern and Southern Hemispheres depicted as allegorical figures, animals and scientific instruments. The style of the constellations follows the Firmamentum Sobiescianum sive Uranographia from 1687 by the Polish astronomer Johannes Hevelius. The chart's design was based on work by the Nuremberg astronomer Georg Christoph Eimmart (1638-1705). In addition to the hemispheres, we see seven diagrams against a background of clouds. At the top left texts from Genesis: God called the light "day", and the darkness He called "night". At the top right the phases of the moon as seen from earth. In the center at the top we see God as the Creator, seated on a cloud and accompanied by putti. At the bottom left: the illumination of the moon by the sun, astronomical models by Tycho Brahe, Copernicus and Ptolemy as well as a model by Van Lansberge about the movement of the earth around the sun. A key to the size of the stars on the hemispheres is shown in the center. Price: Euro 1.950,-  
• About the artist

  Matthias Shutter was born in 1678 in Germany.
  He was one of the most important and prolific German map publishers of the 18th century.
  Seutter started his career as an apprentice brewer. Apparently uninspired by the beer business, Seutter left his apprenticeship and moved to Nuremberg where he apprenticed as an engraver under the tutelage of the prominent J. B. Homann. Sometime in the early 18th century Seutter left Homann to establish his own independent cartographic publishing firm in Augsburg. Though he struggled in the early years of his independence, Seutter’s engraving skill and commitment to diversified map production eventually gained him a substantial following. Most of Seutter’s maps were heavily based upon, if not copies of, earlier work done by the Homann and Delisle firms. By 1732 Seutter was one of the most prolific publishers of his time and was honored by the German Emperor Charles VI with the title of “Imperial Geographer”. Seutter continued to publish until his death, at the height of his career, in 1757. The Seutter firm continued under Seutter’s wastrel son Albrecht Carl until his death in 1762. Following Albrecht’s death, the firm was divided between the established Probst firm and the emerging firm of Tobias Conrad Lotter. Lotter, Matthäus Seutter’s son in law, was a master engraver and worked on behalf of the Seutter firm.
  Seutter died in 1757.

Are you interested in buying this artwork?