Antique Maps, Charts, Atlases and Globes for Sale at Auction

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Antique Map Auction Sale No. 121 - closed 9/26/2007

Featuring 885 lots of rare antique maps, charts, pocket maps, globes and atlases
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Lot #54: "Typus Corporis Lunaris Panselini, Una cum Maculis, Faculis, Montibus…" A. Kircher

Antique map chart Typus Corporis Lunaris Panselini Una cum Maculis Fac
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Estimate:
$800.00 - $900.00
This lot was withdrawn

Lot 54
By: A. Kircher
Subject: Celestial - Moon
Date: 1682

Publication: d'Onder-Aardse Weereld

Condition: A
See Condition Guidelines

Color: hand color

Size: 13 x 14.2 inches
33.1 x 36.1 cm

This marvelous engraving is an early view of the moon graphically depicting its craters based on the observations of Kircher and Christoph Scheiner in 1636 and 1650. Putti in a cloud background hold aloft the banner-style title cartouche. Kircher's masterpiece, titled Mundus subterraneus (The Underground World), was the first serious effort to describe the physical makeup of the earth, proposing theories (sometimes fantastic) in the areas of physics, geography, geology, and chemistry. Published in a Dutch edition of Kircher's famous Subterranean World by Johann Waesberger.

An excellent impression on a sheet with one minor spot in the generous lower margin, well away from the map.


Ref: De Vorsey, Mapping the World Below, Mercator's World Vol. 8 No. 2, pp. 28-31.

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