Svmatra Insvla

Woodcut, taken from Honter's "Rudimenta Cosmographica" published by Henrich Petri, first in 1561.

The maps are produced by Henrich Petri, the same editor of Sebastian Muenster, and are inserted in pages with descriptive text.

Johannes Honter (1498-1549), was a humanist and theologian and worked in Transylvania. He is well known for his activity as a publisher of geographic and cartographic texts and for helping to spread the Lutheran doctrine in Transylvania. His pocket edition of the "Rudimentorum Cosmographiae" was published for the first time in Krakow in 1530 with only 2 maps, including the world map, a simplified and reduced version of that of Waldseemuller of 1513. The edition of 1542 compared to previous was written in verse: the author in fact believed that it would be easier for the students to remember the notions contained in the work. The edition also contained 13 maps engraved by the same Honter depicting the already known parts of the world.