A Rare Spanish View of Jersulem

Rare separately issued view of the Holy Land, published in Madrid by Manuele Navarre.

The view is based upon the work of Christian Van Adrichom, whose work is perhaps the most influential visual representation of the Holy Land. Van Adrichom's plan of ancient Jerusalem and its suburbs at the time of Jesus Christ was later copied by a number of mapmakers, including Braun & Hogenberg. The plan was originally issued in Theatrum Terrae Sanctae" in 1584 in Koln, with a booklet describing Jerusalem.

The plan contains sites and scenes of Jerusalem, both within and outside the city, identified by two hundred and seventy captions - each depicting an item mentioned in the Scriptures, and other historical and traditional sources.

Van Adrichom's plan was later copied by Jodocus Henricus Kramer in the late 17th Century and also forms the basis for Braun & Hogenberg's 2 sheet vertical plan of Ancient Jerusalem (c 1588) and by Jan Jansson in his 1657 town book.

Adrichom (1533-1585) was a Dutch priest whose scholarly research of the Bible and writings of pilgrims and Josephus made him the acknowledged expert on Holy Land geography. Josephus was a Jewish historian who was employed by the Romans to write about the history of Roman Palestine during the Jewish revolt of 60-70 AD. Many of his works contain accurate geographic details based on his firsthand observations. Adrichom was assigned to Cologne during the time it was a thriving center for cartography and atlas publishing.

The present example is quite rare on the market, this being the second example we have ever seen.