Abraham Ortelius - Map Publisher

Map Publisher

In 1564 he published his first map, Typus Orbis Terrarum, an eight-leaved wall map of the world. which subsequently appeared in reduced form in the Terrarum (the only extant copy is in now at Basel University Library). He also published a two-sheet map of Egypt in 1565, a plan of the Brittenburg castle on the coast of the Netherlands in 1568, an eight-sheet map of Asia in 1567, and a six-sheet map of Spain before the appearance of his atlas.

In England Ortelius' contacts included William Camden, Richard Hakluyt, Thomas Penny, puritan controversialist William Charke, and Humphrey Llwyd, who would contribute the map of England and Wales to Ortelius's 1573 edition of the Theatrum.

In 1578 he laid the basis of a critical treatment of ancient geography by his Synonymia geographica (issued by the Plantin press at Antwerp and republished in expanded form as Thesaurus geographicus in 1587 and again expanded in 1596. In this last edition, Ortelius considers the possibility of continental drift, a hypothesis proved correct only centuries later).

In 1596 he received a presentation from Antwerp city, similar to that afterwards bestowed on Rubens. His death on June 28, 1598, and burial, in St Michael’s Præmonstratensian Abbey church in Antwerp, were marked by public mourning. Quietis cultor sine lite, uxore, prole, reads the inscription on his tombstone.