Johann Jakob Scheuchzer (1672-1733) published 34 original works and numerous articles on the subjects of history, science and travel; his subscribers included some of the most notable names of the day, such as Isaac Newton and Hans Sloane. After extensive journeys throughout his native Switzerland, he published a four sheet map of the country in 1712, the same year that a civil war toppled the Old Swiss Confederacy and ended Catholic hegemony. Until the end of the eighteenth century, Scheuchzer’s map was the most accurate cartographical representation of Switzerland in existence. Additionally, Scheuchzer was appointed senior town physician in Zurich in 1733, and for this reason his portrait was included in George Wihelm Zapf’s ‘Abbildungen berühmter & besonders’, a collection of 180 portraits of famous physicians.