5.       Matthäus Merian                                                                                            1650 

Matthäus Merian (b. 1593 in Basel) served an apprenticeship as copperplate engraver under Friedrich Meyer after leaving grammar school. After spending time in Strasburg, Nancy and Paris he returned to Basel where he produced some of his first town plans (circa 1610-1615). He travelled again before he moved to Frankfurt to work for Johann Theodor de Bry, a well-respected publisher. Together with his son of the same name and Martin Zeiler he worked on a multi-volume work of town views and maps of German-speaking areas, Topographia Germaniae. Started in 1642 the work consisted of 16 volumes by 1654 and by 1688 the 30 volumes now included illustrations of other European areas such as France, Italy and Crete. This was one of the most ambitious of all publishing ventures of the time and was issued in many editions. Exeter was one of 17 towns of Great Britain and Ireland which appeared in the year that Merian died (1650) and also in J. C. Beer’s Das neu-beharnischte Grosz-Britannien  published in Nuremberg in 1690. 

Title: Exonia Excester

Size: 160 x 130 mm with no scale or signatures. 

This is a near copy of Speed’s inset but without the reference table or numbers, people or ships, extended east and west with the title on an ornate banner below the City’s Arms in a leaf cartouche. There are minor irregularities to buildings and trees outside of the city walls. [1]

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^[1] Illustration reproduced by kind permission of Devon Archives & Local Studies - .SM B/EXE/1650/MER.

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 6.       Rutgerus Hermannides                                                                      1661

 

The first cartographic work which was solely devoted to maps of British towns appeared in 1661 and contained a general map, a map of London and 30 town plans including that of Exeter. The map was by Rutgerus Hermannides, Professor of History at Harderwijk, and the volume was Britannia Magna published in Amsterdam in that year.

 

Title:  Exonia Excester                                                                                                                                                     

Size: 105 x 130 mm with no scale or signatures.

 

This map has the City Arms (top left). It is a near copy of Speed’s inset, or more correctly of Merian, but without the reference table or numbers, people or ships; the only lettering apart from the title is Exe Fluvius.

The plate was subsequently printed and published in Pierre (Peter) van der Aa’s La galérie Agreeable du monde in 1729 (see below). The plate was modified with the addition of a decorative top border which includes a key to 7 sites (and other places are named on the map) and then placed within a trompe l’oeil engraved frame which doubled the dimensions of the print but retaining title as before. Additions include the signature: A. Leide, Chez Pierre Vander Aa, Marhand, Libraire (below the map detail). This work also included a map of the county of Devon (B&B Printed Maps 13.4) by Pieter van den Keere with a similar elaborate frame.

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