Bidspirit auction | BERLINGHIERI, F. / PTOLEMY, C.

BERLINGHIERI, F. / PTOLEMY, C. Tabula Quarta De Asia. Fine hand color. 13 x 20 inches. Finely framed. cf. Nebenzahl, Maps of the Holy Land, no. 2; Laor, Maps of the Holy Land, no. 600. Florence, c. 1479-1482. ONE OF THE FIRST WESTERN MAPS OF THE MIDDLE EAST & HOLY LAND. A STUNNING EXAMPLE WITH RICH COLOR & GOLD LEAF. Very rare, published in a single edition. One of the first printed maps of the Holy Land and much of the Middle East. It was based on the written texts of the great second-century Alexandrian geographer and astronomer, Claudius Ptolemy. It was the recovery of Ptolemy's work that was the foundation for the Renaissance in geography. Ptolemy's map had great and long-reaching influence: “the contours of the 'Asia Part IV' served as a matrix for Holy Land maps as late as the eighteenth century…Ptolemy represented scientific cartography and Renaissance mapmakers based their 'modern' maps on his classical achievement” (Nebenzahl). Moreover, the edition in which this map appeared was published in Florence, the city that was the heart of the Renaissance. Berlinghieri's was the third printed edition of Ptolemy (along with the Ulm edition)published no later than 1482. There were previous editions in Bologna (1477) and Rome (1478), but only examples from the latter are ever seen on the market. This Florence edition of Ptolemy's atlas, with text in verse by Berlinghieri, was not dated. However, internal evidence securely dictates that it could not have been published later than September 1482 (see Shirley, Mapping of the World, no. 9). One scholar has suggested that the maps were engraved as early as 1472, which would pre-date all known printed editions of Ptolemy. Current research places the engraving of the maps between 1479 and 1482. The Berlinghieri is also one of the rarest editions of the Ptolemy atlas, as it appeared in a single edition. Noteworthy also is its publication in Florence, where copperplate engraving first developed in Italy. This map appeared at a time when the graphic problems of how a map is to be presented were just beginning to be worked out. Thus, the map contains several earmarks of early copperplate engraving, such as the use of Roman monumental type and the primitive representations of topographic features, such as mountains.