MÜNSTER, Sebastian (1489-1552). Cosmographia. Basel: Henricpetri, 1628.

“The first modern” work of cosmology (Hodgen), in contemporary binding. Münster was a cartographer, historian, and linguist who combined his expertise to create this tour-de-force work, which “brought all the empires of man into a single meaningful progression…[and] this single thread of history he married to geography, so that each should mirror and illuminate the other” (McLean). Originally published in German in 1544, editions in many other languages followed quickly. See Margaret T. Hodgen, "Sebastian Muenster (1489-1552): A Sixteenth-Century Ethnographer," in Osiris 11 and Matthew McLean, The Cosmographia of Sebastian Münster: Describing the World in the Reformation.

Folio (379 x 237mm). Title printed in red and black. Engraved additional title by Merian, 26 double-page woodcut maps, numerous other woodcuts in-text including many double-page views, one large folding woodcut view (browned, with some spots and stains, closed tear in lower margin of one leaf). Contemporary blindstamped pigskin over woden boards, brass bosses, clasps, and catchplates, edges blue. Provenance: Johann Hermann (1738-1800, French naturalist and doctor; Bibliotheca Hermanniana inscription on flyleaf).