Caspar Vopelius

Article about Caspar Vopelius in Heinrich Pantaleon's Prosopographiae heroum atque illustrium virorum totius Germaniae , Basel, 1565–1566

Caspar Vopelius (* 1511 in Medebach , † 1561 in Cologne ; also Vopel, Vopell, Vöpell or Meydebachius) was an astronomer , instrument maker and cartographer and taught at the Montanergymnasium in Cologne. His main occupation was mathematical and geographical studies as the basis of his works.

Life

Vopelius probably came from a respected and wealthy family, although nothing is known about his parents. At least one Hermann Vöpelen was judge and mayor of Medebach in 1530 . During his school days in Medebach, Vopelius, as he later called himself, occupied himself with mathematical studies. In 1526 Vopelius went to Cologne and enrolled at the University of Cologne on May 10th of that year . In November 1527 he became a Baccalaureus and in March 1529 Licentitat and Magister artium . He taught at the Montaner Gymnasium in Cologne, where he also dealt with mathematical and cartographic work. He was the direct successor of the humanist Henricus Glareanus . This position enabled Vopelius to acquire citizenship in Cologne and to marry Enge van Aich, the daughter of a well-known printer. It is not known whether the marriage resulted in children. He bought a house in Schildergasse from his father-in-law Arnt von Aich . Although his wife's family was close to the Reformation , Vopelius himself remained loyal to the old denomination. He evidently avoided the religious struggles in Cologne between 1545 and 1555 by traveling for a long time. In the contemporary representation “Teutscher Nation Herligkeit” (1609) it says about him: “Four miles from Waldeck to Cologne lies Medebach, the birthplace of Caspar Vopelius, the artful and well-experienced geographer who was a citizen here in Cologne and his apartment in St. Pawels had next to the swans. "

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The maps and globes in particular are counted among the most important works of their time.

Globes

In 1532 Vopelius created his first astronomical work with a hand-lettered and painted celestial globe . He then introduced the hair of Berenike and Antinous, which was partly known in antiquity but not in the Middle Ages, as new constellations . While the hair of Berenike prevailed, Antinous was assigned to the constellation eagle at the astronomical conference in Leiden in 1928, at which today's 88 constellations were established. - A second celestial globe, now printed, followed in 1536. Both globes are now kept in the Cologne City Museum. In 1542 a terrestrial globe appeared, which is also kept in Cologne. This corresponded to the then known geographical knowledge. In the same year Vopelius created an armillary sphere of which several copies have been preserved. One of them is kept in Copenhagen . Another is the Städtisches Museum Medebach . In 1545 he built an astrolabe .

Maps

From the same year he concentrated on the production of maps. First, in 1545, he created a no longer preserved world map, followed by a map of Europe in 1555. There was also a map of the Rhineland, which he dedicated to the Cologne City Council and for which he received 10 thalers as a thank you. The Rhine maps, of which a colored copy of the first print in 1855 exists in the Herzog August Library in Wolfenbüttel, have a scale of around 1: 590,000. It is considered a model for future traffic maps. Also in 1558 a map of the world was published, which Vopelius dedicated to Emperor Charles V. Completely outside of his other work was the creation of a "bloodletting table" for doctors.

The Rhine route map

The Rhine route map also contains a precise representation of Lake Constance, the High Rhine and the Upper Rhine. This section is based on information from Glarus Aegidius Tschudi and Dean Johannes Stumpf from Stein am Rhein. The sources are unknown for the Upper and Middle Rhine. In the area of ​​the mouth of the Rhine he referred to Dutch sources. Another map of the Rhine appeared in 1558 and was dedicated to the then elector of Cologne. This map evidently attracted considerable attention, so that a third edition was necessary in 1560. Twelve reprints are known. There is also a Rhine route map in the Rhineland-Palatinate (?) State Library and the Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania State Library . Vopelius's Rhine route map was also published as a facsimile by the Hamburg geographer Michow in 1903.

Web links

• NRW Foundation: Armillary Sphere of Caspar Vopelius - A present for Medebach
• Elly Dekker: Caspar Vopel's advance into the cartography of the sky in the 16th century
• Scan of the Rhine route map from 1558 on gallica.bnf.fr, accessed on February 3, 2016

literature

• Commons: Messages from the city archive of Cologne 1885 - Globes by Volpelius. P. 45
• Herbert Koch : Caspar Vopelius., Cartographer in Cologne 1511-1561 (= from the history of the Vopelius family , volume IV), Vopelius: Jena 1937.
• Johann Jakob Merlos: Vopel (Vopelius), Kaspar. In: Cologne artists in old and new times. Edited by Firmenich-Richartz, Düsseldorf 1895, Sp. 907-910.
• H. Michow: Caspar Vopell, a Cologne cartographer of the 16th century. In: Festschrift d. Hamburg America Celebration , Vol. I, Hamburg 1892, pp. 5–22.
• Clemens Müller: Caspar Vopelius, mathematician, astronomer and cartographer from Medebach. In: Yearbook Hochsauerlandkreis , year 1986.
• Pantaleon: Prosagraphia heorum atque illustrium virorum. Basel 1565.
• Mathias Quad: Teutscher Nation Gluteness. Cologne 1609.
• Hermann Keussen :  Vopelius, Kaspar . In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 40, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1896, p. 299.
• Leonard Korth, “The Cologne Globes of Kaspar Vopelius von Medebach (1511–1561),” Journal for Patriotic History and Antiquity 42, pt. 2 (1884): 169–78.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b c d e} H. Michow: Caspar Vopell, a Cologne cartographer of the 16th century. In: Festschrift d. Hamburg America Celebration, Vol. I, Hamburg 1892, p. 6.
2. ↑ cit. after: Clemens Müller: Caspar Vopelius, mathematician, astronomer and cartographer from Medebach. In: Yearbook Hochsauerlandkreis, year 1986. P. 28.
3. ↑ See Elly Dekker, Caspar Vopel's Ventures in Sixteenth-Century Celestial Cartography, in: Imago Mundi 62, 2 (2010), 161–190.
4. ↑ Gernhard Braun: A masterpiece of the "black art". In: Südkurier from June 19, 2013.