Office World Map - Lithographed Paper - G.thomas House - period: XIXth century

Desktop map in lithographed paper applied on a cardboard sphere (wear and lacks) brass frame, on a blackened turned wooden base.   This piece was published by the house g. Thomas, 44 rue notre-dame des champs – paris. The terrestrial sphere is at a scale of 70, 000, 000 (1mm for 70 km). Detailed description of ocean currents, continents, rivers, mountains, capital cities, settlements (possessions). Period: napoleon III - xixth. Dimensions: height: 39cm – diameter of the base: 14, 5cm. Did you know that this globe, called world map, was invented by a belgian, a certain gérard de kremer, born in 1512 in rupelmonde, a small village that is now part of the entity of kruibeke, a municipality located between antwerp and saint-nicolas This gérard de kremer is much better known as "mercator". He could have become a philosopher, but he left the university of leuven and in 1534 he turned to the study of geography and mathematics with the dutch mathematician gemma frisius. Three years later, he achieved his first masterstroke by drawing a map of the holy land, hailed by all his contemporaries. And the one now called gerardus mercator did not stop there.  In 1538, he published his first map of the world, particularly valuable for navigators. Charles V was interested in him and, to thank him, mercator presented him in 1541 with a first terrestrial globe already relatively accurate.   But the tide is turning. He then encountered the vicissitudes of life and was arrested in leuven in 1544 for heresy.  Born into a catholic family, when protestantism was gaining ground, he adhered to luther's doctrine and was accused of an exchange of suspicious letters with the franciscan fathers of mechelen. For nine months, he was imprisoned in the castle of rupelmonde, the commune where he had been born. Upon his release, he moved to duisburg in germany and accepted the chair.