Emery Molyneux
Emery Molyneux († June 1598 in Amsterdam ) was the first manufacturer of globes in England (including 1592).
Life
Molyneux was an instrument maker including hour glasses and compasses in London with a workshop in Lambeth . At the suggestion of John Davis , the wealthy merchant William Sanderson commissioned him to manufacture globes with an initial investment of £ 1,000. He got the information from sailors and from navigation manuals. He himself also had nautical experience, he had accompanied Francis Drake on his circumnavigation from 1577 to 1580. He seems to have received information from Walter Raleigh and may have accompanied Thomas Cavendish on his circumnavigation of the world in 1587/88 and John Davis. In addition to Wright, he was in contact with the doctor and astrologer Simon Forman, the mathematician Robert Hues and the Flemish cartographer Jodocus Hondius , who lived in London from 1584 to 1593.
The advances in the manufacture of the globe were mentioned by Richard Hakluyt in his The Principal Navigational in 1589 , and in 1591 Molyneux presented drafts of the world maps to Queen Elizabeth . Several books appeared on the globes (Thomas Hood 1592, Robert Hues 1594, Thomas Blundeville 1594), also by Molyneux himself in 1592, but this has been lost. In addition to earth globes, he also made celestial globes as copies of globes by Gerhard Mercator . The globes came in various designs, the most expensive at £ 20. Sanderson gave a pair of earth and celestial globes each to Oxford and Cambridge universities . Six of his globes have survived, including a pair of earth and celestial globes in the Middle Temple in London. A terrestrial globe is in Petworth House in West Sussex and a celestial globe in the Hessisches Landesmuseum Kassel (the former terrestrial globe was probably destroyed in the Second World War). None of the smaller globes (which were often used on ships) have survived. The globes are mentioned by William Shakespeare in the Comedy of Errors and by Thomas Dekker (The Gull's Hornbook 1609).
Richard Hakluyt published the so-called Wright-Molyneux world map, which uses the Mercator projection , in the second edition of the Principal Navigation in 1599 . Molyneux worked with the mathematician Edward Wright .
In the 1590s he turned to the design and manufacture of cannons and offered his cannon to the English government for coastal defense. When this did not bear fruit, he went to Amsterdam with his wife in 1596/97 and offered his cannon there. They were interested and granted him a patent in 1598, but he died soon afterwards. He probably hoped to be able to sell globes better to European customers from Amsterdam. He probably sold his plans and printing plates for globes to Hondius. Since his widow received a charitable contribution of 50 florins from the Dutch , he probably died in poverty.
After his death, globes were not manufactured again in England until the 1670s.
literature
- AM Crinò, Helen M. Wallis: New researches on the Molyneux globes. In: The Globusfreund. Volume 35, No. 7, 1987, pp. 11-18
- HM Wallis: The first english terrestrial globe , Der Globusfreund, Volume 11, 1962, pp. 158-159
- HM Wallis: Opera mundi: Emery Molyneux, Jodocus Hondius and the first English globes. In: TC van Uchelen, K. van der Horst, G. Schilder (editor): Theatrum orbis librorum. , Liber amicorum presented to Nico Israel on occasion of his 70th birthday. Utrecht: HES 1989, pp. 94-104
- HM Wallis: The first English globe: a recent discovery. In: The Geographical Journal. Volume 117, 1951, pp. 275-290 (the globe in Petworth House)
- HM Wallis: Further light on the Molyneux globes. In: The Geographical Journal. Volume 121, 1955, pp. 304-311
Web links
- Susan M. Maxwell: Molyneux, Emery. In: Oxford Dictionary of National Biography . Oxford University Press, 2004, online 2008
- Molyneux Globe , National Trust Collections
- The history of Cartography, University of Chicago Press, Online, for Molyneux Globus Volume 3, Part 1, Chapter 6, Ely Dekker Globes in Renaissance Europe
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Molyneux, Emery |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | British cartographer |
| DATE OF BIRTH | 16th Century |
| DATE OF DEATH | June 1598 |
| Place of death | Amsterdam |