Philipp Apian’s 'Große Karte': Preliminary Drawings

Philipp Apian was born in Ingolstadt in 1531 and taught mathematics at the university there. After his conversion to Protestantism he had to leave Bavaria in 1569 and became professor of astronomy and geometry in Tübingen, where he died in 1589. With his topographical survey of Bavaria, he achieved such a thorough, sophisticated compilation in terms of surveying and artistic standards that it was only excelled by cartographers in the 18th century. Apian kept a notebook on distance measurements (Apianana VI) during his land surveying travels. Between 1554 and 1563 he created a monumental map ('Große Karte') of Bavaria on a scale of 1:45,000 by order of Duke Albrecht V (reigned 1550-1759). During the course of creating this great map, Apian produced preliminary drawings (Cod.icon. 142(1-7), that make the scope and planning of the undertaking clear. These preliminary drawings are particularly important because the great map was destroyed in a fire in 1782.