3.       Braun & Hogenberg                                                                        1618

 

The German partnership of Georg Braun and Frans Hogenberg copied Hooker at a similar scale thus laying the path for the larger series of Hooker-based plans. Georg Braun (1541-1622) was born in Cologne. Frans (or Francis) Hogenberg (c.1536-1588), and his brother, Remigius (Remy, 1536-1587) were also of German descent but had fled from the Dutch town of Mechelen to England during a period of religious unrest. Frans returned to the Netherlands but Remigius remained in England. Braun and Hogenberg, together with engravers such as Georg Hoefnagel, Daniel Freese and Heinrich Rantzau compiled a city atlas. Their Civitates Orbis Terrarum was intended as a companion work to the Theatrum Orbis Terrarum (of Abraham Ortelius), or atlas of the world and was edited by Georg Braun. Six volumes were issued between 1572 and 1618 and it was in the final volume that Exeter was included: Theatri Praecipuarum Totius Urbium Liber Sextus. Anno MIXVIII… Georgius Braun et Franciscus Hogenbergius.[1] Remigius Hogenberg had engraved Hooker’s original plan in 1587, and it is probably through him the plan came to Frans. 

Title:  CIVITAS EXONIAE (vulgo Excester) URBIS PRIMARIA IN COMITATU DEVONIAE.

Size: 317 x 395 mm but with no scale and no signature. 

This is a Hooker’s 1587 plan though slightly smaller but exquisitely engraved. The title is on a banner and the plan has three coats of arms: The Royal Arms supported by a lion and a dragon; the City’s Arms, supported by pegassi; and Hooker’s own arms with a note Insignia Iohannis Hooker (bottom left). This again is a bird’s eye view with the country to the east, stopping like Hooker, on the line of hills. The most noticeable difference is the reduced area. In the foreground the tower of St. Thomas is brought nearer to the river and the adjacent houses are crowded together. On the left hand side Pound Lane is cut off and St. David’s is moved to Exe Lane. Yet the shadowed building faces are changed, the west barbican is almost lost as is the stream down Combe Street, without its out-fall through the walls. Most churches are named, as are some streets and while the boats repeat there are now pedestrians (see detail opposite; note also the Great Conduit). Larkbeare and Radford Place are now in a line, the crane seller is still active and the Bridwell of Speed becomes the Brydewol.

Some copies have plain backs but most have Latin, French or German texts initially on the left side of the reverse, on both sides for later reissues, but there were no changes to the plan. There were a number of copies including Daniel Lysons 1822 (B&B Printed Maps 89, see below) and Edward Freeman 1887 (c.f.).

Exeter was a crowded and socially divided city. As early as 1525[2], the wealthier merchants lived in the four parishes of St. Petrock and St. Mary Arches, St. Olave and St. Stephen, in effect in the centre of the city or close to the Cathedral. Within the walls, the poorest lived in the parishes of St. John, All Hallows on the Walls and St. Mary Steps, in effect the Old Britayne quarter of Saxon days (or Little Britaine on Speed). This division was also reflected in the houses. The well-to-do merchant’s house still contained the shop and the warehouse with a court and garden. The hall was the eating chamber with the parlour as the family room. Above there were up to five bedrooms, with possibly servants’ rooms above. Below or next to the hall was the kitchen and buttery and below them a cellar.[3] Whereas a weaver’s house, socially divided for example, contained merely the hall, two bedrooms, a kitchen and the shop. When one went further down and out into Duryard or St. Sidwell’s one room would have to suffice. This was still the medieval pattern, and explains the crowded plans of Hooker in 1600. This layout would remain so on Ichabod Fairlove’s plan of 1709 (entry 8) and even into the 19th century.

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[1] The preface was signed by Antonius Hierat & Abrahamus Hogenberg. The text was by Abraham Ortel (i.e. Ortelius) & Cornelius Caymox.

[2] See, for example, Hoskins (1960) 2000 Years in Exeter and MacCaffrey (1958) Exeter 1540-1640.

[3] A good example is the 1603 inventory of the late Mayor, Richard Bevys cloth merchant, where his house is described as such. It was drawn up in some fifty accounts and in summary valued his estate as £3284.9s.2d-. DA/XLI/1909.

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