Share on Facebook Share on Twitter Email
Answers.com

Sebastian Münster

 
German Literature Companion: Sebastian Münster
Home > Library > Literature & Language > German Literature Companion

Münster, Sebastian (Ingelheim, c.1489-1552, Basel), originally a Franciscan friar, became a Protestant and taught theology and Hebrew at Heidelberg and, from 1529, at Basel. In 1534-5 he edited the first complete version of the Hebrew Bible (2 vols.) to appear by a German scholar. He was notable as a geographer producing in 1544 the Cosmographia Universalis, profusely illustrated with woodcuts and repeatedly reprinted, especially in the 16th c. and 17th c.

Search unanswered questions...

Enter a question here...
Search: All sources Community Q&A Reference topics

 
Columbia Encyclopedia: Sebastian Münster
Top
Home > Library > Miscellaneous > Columbia Encyclopedia - People
Münster, Sebastian (sābäs'tyän' mün'stər), 1489-1552, German scholar and geographer. He was a Franciscan monk but after the Reformation became a Protestant and taught at Heidelberg and at Basel, where he lived after 1536. A noted theologian and Hebraist, he edited the first Hebrew Bible produced (1534-35) by a German. His chief work is the Cosmographia universalis (1544), a descriptive geography standard for more than a century and translated into several languages.
Wikipedia: Sebastian Münster
Top
Home > Library > Miscellaneous > Wikipedia
Cosmographia

Sebastian Münster (20 January 1488 – 26 May 1552), [1] was a German cartographer, cosmographer, and a Hebrew scholar.

Portrait of Sebastian Münster by Christoph Amberger, c. 1552

Contents

Life

Münster was born at Ingelheim near Mainz, the son of Andreas Munster. He was appointed to the University of Basel in 1527. As Professor of Hebrew, he edited the Hebrew Bible, accompanied by a Latin translation.

His work, the Cosmographia from 1544 was the earliest German description of the world. It had numerous editions in different languages including Latin, French, Italian, English, and even Czech. The last German edition was published in 1628, long after his death. The Cosmographia was one of the most successful and popular books of the 16th century. It passed through 24 editions in 100 years. New_International_Encyclopedia This success was due to the fascinating woodcuts (some by Hans Holbein the Younger, Urs Graf, Hans Rudolph Manuel Deutsch, and David Kandel). It was most important in reviving geography in 16th century Europe.

In 1540 he published a Latin edition of Ptolemy's Geographia with illustrations. The 1550 edition contains cities, portraits, and costumes. These editions, printed in Germany, are the most valued of the Cosmographias.

Münster also wrote the Dictionarium trilingue in Latin, Greek, and Hebrew and Mappa Europae (map of Europe) in 1536. He died at Basel of the plague in 1552.

He was pictured on the old 100 DM banknotes that were replaced at the beginning of the 1990s.

Statue of Sebastian Münster in front of St. Remigius Church, Ingelheim

Cover of first edition of Cosmographia

his home town Ingelheim in Cosmographia

Porträt of Sebastian Münsters, edition of 1628

Portraits of Sebastian Münster

Old 100 DM banknote, 1962-1991

Several paintings with oil on canvas, woodcuts and copper etchings depict Sebastian Münster, by Hans Holbein d. J. (Basel, c. 1530), Willem de Haen (1615), as rector of the University of Basel (by Christoph Amberger, um 1547), and on the 100-DM-bill as used 1962 to 1991.

Literature

  • Karl Heinz Burmeister: Sebastian Münster - Versuch eines biographischen Gesamtbildes. Basler Beiträge zur Geschichtswissenschaft, Band 91, Basel und Stuttgart 1963 und 1969.
  • Karl Heinz Burmeister: Sebastian Münster - Eine Bibliographie. Wiesbaden 1964.
  • Hans Georg Wehrens: Freiburg in der „Cosmographia“ von Sebastian Münster (1549); in Freiburg im Breisgau 1504 - 1803, Holzschnitte und Kupferstiche. Verlag Herder, Freiburg 2004, S. 34 ff. ISBN 3-451-20633-1.
  • Günther Wessel: Von einem, der daheim blieb, die Welt zu entdecken - Die Cosmographia des Sebastian Münster oder Wie man sich vor 500 Jahren die Welt vorstellte. Campus Verlag, Frankfurt 2004, ISBN 3-593-37198-7.
  • Ludwig Geiger: Münster, Sebastian. In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Band 23, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1886, S. 30–33. (German)
  • Claus Priesner: Münster, Sebastian. In: Neue Deutsche Biographie (NDB). Band 18, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1997, S. 539–541. (German)

References

  1. ^ MapForum Issue 10

External links

Search Wikisource German Wikisource has original text related to this article:
Search Wikimedia Commons Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Sebastian Münster

This entry is from Wikipedia, the leading user-contributed encyclopedia. It may not have been reviewed by professional editors (see full disclaimer)

 
 

 

Copyrights:

German Literature Companion. The Oxford Companion to German Literature. Copyright © 1976, 1986, 1997, 2005 by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved.  Read more
Columbia Encyclopedia. The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition Copyright © 2003, Columbia University Press. Licensed from Columbia University Press. All rights reserved. www.cc.columbia.edu/cu/cup/.  Read more
Wikipedia. This article is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Sebastian Münster".  Read more