Atlas Russicus
a milestone 265 years ago
Acquired and published in Saint Petersburg
by the
Imperial Academy of Sciences
founded by Peter in 1725 and here
in deep coloring
of all the quality of its age
as most seldom only :
Uncolored only
the copy of the spectacular 1991 exhibition
(see below)
Uncolored only , too ,
the copy on larger paper sold with Sotheby’s at 2-6-2006
at the price of 25700 Euro (18000 £)
De L’Isle – Atlas Rvssicvs … Vastissimvm Imperivm Rvssicvm cum adiacentibvs Regionibvs. Under the supervision of Leonhard Euler and Gottfried Heinsius ed. by the Imperial Academy of Sciences in Petersburg. Petersburg, the author, 1745. Large folio. 16 pp. With
general map folded several times
+
19 double full-page detail maps
(c. 49-50 x 56 and 56.5 x 98 cm resp.) after Joseph Nicolas De L’Isle (1688 Paris 1768) and others,
all in copperplate engraving with contemporary flat coloring .
Marbled contemp. h. calf with back-plate, leather edges, and marbled boards. Paled marbled edges.
Literature
Bagrow-Castner II, pp. 177-253; Phillips 4060 (erroneously or originally not belonging to with additional 4 ll. preliminaries, otherwise together with additional war maps); Goldenberg + Postnikov, Development of Mapping Methods in Russia in the 18th century, in IMAGO MUNDI XXXVII, 63-80; Nitsche-Stender 141; Lexikon der Kartographie 688; Teleki, Atlas zur Geschichte der Kartographie der japanischen Inseln pl. 17,1 (pl. 19 of the atlas); Niemeyer, Rußlands Aufbruch in die Moderne – Peter der Große und die Entwicklung der russischen Kartographie, Bonn 1991, 5 + illustrations.
Exhibition
(Treasures from the Kremlin – Peter the Great in Western Europe). Bremen, Übersee-Museum, 1991 (18 weeks incl. extension). – Catalogue no. 158 (uncolored copy).
Title + text – description of the maps regarding bordering, origin, accuracy and execution of surveying, transcription of the Russian alphabet; partly detailed Russian explanations of words; engraved rich conventional signs and symbols up to salterns + hot springs, this by the way engraved – in Latin + French parallel text (a Russian + German-language version of the same year with fewer text preliminaries = Phillips 4059 and 3109 resp. each with erroneous comment to map 19 “showing the extreme point of Alaska and the Aleutian islands”, recte on the contrary Kamchatka + Kuriles).
Text part with the Honig watermarks HONIG / IV + crowned large fleur-de-lis arms with the ligated label WR. – One map cut inside the lower margin, but without injuring the picture itself, 5 maps trimmed on or with loss of upper or lower border line, 2 maps cut inside white platemark, one of them at loss of miles indicator and numbering. Otherwise single small repaired tears in the margins and two not disturbing tear outs. Carefully rebound with restored spine, the old boards on the front a little, on the back more rubbed and damaged, but without impairing the general impression of a fine fresh copy.
The deep coloring
of all the quality of its age
at which the cartouches, as frequently with contemporarily colored old atlasses up to the legendary Atlas of the Great Elector, were left in black and white.
As the first complete atlas of Russia
the decisive milestone
on the way to modern Russia :
“ Russian mapping, sponsored by Peter the Great – who in 1719, for example, occasionally an expedition at the coast of Kamchatka sent out two officers of his navy
to answer Leibniz’ question
about a connection between Asia + America –
and his associates, is known to have followed the way of intensive scientific development in connection with the state reforms and an active foreign policy in the 18th century. The fulfilment of new economic, administrative, cultural, military, and political tasks, conditioned by the developments of productive forces, required comprehensive studies of the country as well as the compilation and use of new complete and accurate maps. The creation of the All-Russian market necessitated the compiling of general maps and atlasses while an expansion of economic relations between different regions generated a need for more detailed maps of particular areas. From the point of view of the history of cartography, we can find in this period a rich field for studying the process of transition from the national traditional methods of large-scale mapping (drawings) to surveys and map construction on a scientific base.
This process required the creative reworking
of the West-European cartographic methods
by Russian cartographers as well as application
of the national mapping traditions
to the conditions of a vast area of the country “
(Goldenberg-Postnikov).
This was the goal of the high-protectioned work of the geographical department of the Academy of Sciences founded by Peter the Great (1672-1725) who is also said to be among the authors of the famous “punkty” – “The first official instructions on land survey and map-making” – of 1721. During his first stay in the Netherlands he also learned the art of engraving (“… learned under the direction of 17 year old Marie de Wilde (daughter of the merchant and collector Jacobus de W. in Amsterdam to whom he was on friendly terms) the use of the etching-needle … what he wanted to get from such work was, just as with shipbuilding: To learn the crafts needed in Russia … engraving and etching is tightly connected with printing maps …”, Gerson, Ausbreitung und Nachwirkung der holländischen Malerei … p. 516). His “service to the propagation of geographical knowledge” K. E. von Baer investigated (St. Petersburg, 1872; but see also K. Waliscevski, Peter the Great, N.Y. 1897, p. 435).
Asked for was a really new map-making
using astronomically set fixed-points. At the top of the western astronomers and geographers called to Russia was J. N. Delisle who worked there from 1725-47 and whose astronomical school founded at the Academy produced some high reputed Russian astronomers while his work for the atlas of 1745 – preceded in 1734 by the not so important one of Ivan Kirilov – suffered by friction. And “against the ban he copied all Russian maps and sent them secretly to Paris where they now form ( – but without the General Map – ) a valuable collection” (Bagrow-Skelton). He was simply reputed as “the French expert of Russia” (Galkovich). But he also was reproached for working too slow. A lack of topicality caused by this and poor accuracy were the reasons for him that he did not liked to be named with the atlas. Just as M. V. Lomonosov criticized :
“ Having looked at the archives and the published Atlas it is easy to understand how much more accurate and complete it could have been ”
(Coll. works, Moscow 1955, IX, 258).
Assigned to Delisle as assistant had been the young Gottfried Heinsius, extraordinary professor of astronomy and member of the Academy working in Petersburg from 1736 to 1745. See ADB XI, 656.
The detail maps 1-13 covering European Russia at a scale of 1 : 1,527,000 and thus constructed markedly larger than the Asian ones and furthermore adorned with mostly rich figurative-instructive title-cartouches. The following 6 maps of the Asian part – east of rivers Irtysh/Ob, but still up to the Petschora delta – at a scale of only 1 : 3,360,000 with just a title strip. Whether this is to be attributed to the economical importance and the degree of acquaintance then or expression of an inappropriate request for a precipitate completion of the works as criticized by Delisle may be left undecided here.
Of special historic interest
the entrance of the Volga-Don-Canal
plotted on the Volga district map. First the version as sketched in 1697 during a discussion between Leibniz and the Russian ambassador Golovin. It connects the tributaries Ilovlya + Kamyshenka and bases on a venture started by Sultan Selim II in 1568 and is also to be found in the manuscript map mentioned above, but not in the general map of the atlas. In print this version appears for the first time on a special map in Cornelis Cry’s atlas of the River Don of 1703/04. Then, somewhat southern, the connection Zarizyn (Volgograd) – Katchalinsk first appearing in the great manuscript travel map of Russia of c. 1683 and almost similar to the course of the canal completed in 1952. For more see Leo Bagrow, The Volga-Don-Canal, in I. M. X, 97 f.
Of further extraordinary importance for the development of cartography
the supposedly first representation of the Kuriles
as a chain of named islands in uninterrupted sequence
stretching between northern Japan – the northern ends of which on the lower map border – and Kamchatka. The disputed islands correctly set off against the other and situated nearer to Japan. Thus without the obscure Staaten Island, Terre de la Compagnie and Terre de Jean da Gama, which were to be found in the maps by Kirilov and Haas, but also even in much later ones.
For the cartographical rank of the atlas see Goldenberg-Postnikov’s résumé:
“ Atlasses, maps and large scale plans become the principal basis for the development of topographic maps. They remain as remarkable monuments of the history of Russian cartography created by the toilers of field cartography … From the point of view of studying the maps of Russia of the 18th century as historico-geographical sources, the cartographic materials of general land survey are undoubtedly the most abundant and valuable sources in spite of their relative imperfections. ”
And especially of the atlas here
“ … Delisle’s contemporaries … had a very high opinion …
and the famous German scholar Euler
demonstrated it to his own country as an example
for no such a complete atlas existed of Germany then ”
(Bagrow, Meister der Kartographie, p. 251).
The area comprised
corresponding with the borders of the reign of Elisabeth Petrovna, daughter of Peter (1709-62, empress since 1741). In the east up to Bering Strait with the Kuriles and northern Japan, in the SE the River Amur district later acquired by Alexander II (emperor since 1855) down to today’s Vladivostok. Further to the sources of Kerulen, Selenga + Irtysh – Caspian southern banks – River Arax – then crossing the Black Sea on the line Trapesunt – Constanca – westernly up to Kiew – Memel – Helsinki with parts of Finland – Norwegian border area . In the north up to c. 85° northern latitude.
All in all
the documentation of a departure to modern times
as a contemporarily colored copy .
Offer no. 14,977 / price on request
„ heute kam das Paket – vielen Dank für die excellente Verpackung. Das Bild ist wirklich sehr schön … Wir freuen uns auf Ihre (weitere) Nachricht. Herzliche Grüße aus F. “
(Herr + Frau T. C., 13. Mai 2002)