2. Bry, Theodor de

Antique Maps by Theodor de Bry (*1528 - †1598)

Theodor de Bry was a Flemish engraver and publisher, born in 1528 in Liege. 1578 he moved with his family to Frankfurt am Main, where he founded an engraving and publishing company.

In the years 1586 and 1588 he lived in London, where he worked with the geographer Richard Hakluyt. He collected travel reports and illustrations of European research expeditions. After his return in 1589, T. de Bry and his sons Johann Theodor and Johann Israel began to publish the two most important collections of Renaissance travelogue. Between 1590 and 1634, they published under the title America and the New World and India orientalis a comprehensive work out of 27 volumes, which are the most important travel books of the 16th Century. Equipped with large copper plate illustrations and explanatory text, a work arose that documents until today, how the countries of the Americas, Africa and Asia and its inhabitants looked like at the time of discovery and how the Europeans saw them.

Theodor de Bry was able to publish only six parts of his complete work. After his death in 1598, the work was continued by his sons and later by Johann Theodor's son-in-law Matthew Merian until 1634.

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