Catalog Archive
Auction 120, Lot 55

"[Creation of Earth]", Goeree, Willelm & Jan

Subject: Cartographic Miscellany

Period: 1700 (circa)

Publication:

Color: Hand Color

Size:
6.7 x 10.7 inches
17 x 27.2 cm
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This is a very unusual print from a Dutch book on church history published by the Goeree brothers. It illustrates the controversial theories of Thomas Burnet, the first Englishman to attempt a scientific account of the origin of the earth. His popular treatise focused on the breaking up of "the fountains of the great deep" as the cause of the flood, as described in Genesis, and it presented a model of the earth's structure with ample stores of water within subterranean chambers. This view shows a split, egg-shaped earth at the top and the exterior at the bottom with water coming from within the earth to form rain clouds. The lower image is ingeniously constructed with one engraving pasted on top of another; so that you see the crust of the earth on the top engraving, and when you lift it you see the interior core underneath.

References:

Condition: A+

Estimate: $110 - $140

Sold for: $250

Closed on 7/18/2007

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