Maps
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In this section we gather together information for the collector. We offer advice on building and housing your maps and books, provide biographies of mapmakers, and a glossary of bookselling terms, and we draw together some common themes that span our collections, and tell stories of the histories of exploration and cartography.
Featured items
DCRB visit to the Vermeer exhibition 2023
Gathering 28 of his 37 known works, the Vermeer exhibition at the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam has brought together more of his paintings than ever before. Despite being one of the most highly anticipated and in-demand exhibitions in recent years, some of the team at DCRB were lucky enough to get a closer look at the 17th century masterpieces.
The latest news
Here Are 9 Treasures That Caught Our Eye at TEFAF Maastricht—From Antique Playing Cards to a Rediscovered Ambrosi Sculpture
17 March 2023
One of the biggest art fairs in the world, TEFAF Maastricht, in its 2023 edition, brought together some 270 dealers from around the world, collectively offering 7,000 years of art history in nearly every conceivable medium, from grand Old Master paintings to African tribal art to fine jewelry. Sifting through the countless gems is an overwhelming proposition, with treasures everywhere you turn your head.
Here are nine of our favorites.
How to
A guide to your collection
Are you new to collecting maps? Would you like guidance on how to handle the books and maps in your collection?
From the glossary
Etching
An intaglio technique with a visual result similar to drawing, etched lines are usually free with blunt terminations as a result of the artist drawing with a sharp tool through a soft, often wax-based, ground coated on the plate. Volume and contour is created using a technique called hatching, where the artist changes the spaces, angles, lengths and qualities of the lines. The plate is then placed into an acid bath, where the acid eats away, or “bites,” the exposed metal of the incised lines leaving the areas that are coated with ground untouched. The artist can achieve a broad range of tonality with etching by controlling the time the plate spends in the acid-bath.
Mapmaker biographies
APIANUS, Petrus
Born in Saxony as Peter Bienewitz, he studied at the University of Leipzig from 1516 to 1519, where he adopted the Latinised version of his German name, Petrus Apianus. In 1519, he moved to Vienna, where he was part of the second Vienna school of cartography, which included Georgius Tannstetter and Johannes Cuspinianus. He then moved again to Landshut, where he produced the Cosmographicus liber in 1524, an extremely popular work on astronomy and navigation which underwent thirty reprints. Based on Ptolemy, it contains paper instruments called volvelles, which Apianus would use so effectively in his work that they are sometimes known as Apian wheels.