Cartographica Neerlandica Background for Ortelius Map No. 64

Title: LEODIENSIS DIOCESIS TYPVS Title: LEODIENSIS DIOCESIS TYPVS [A Map of the Diocese Liege] (bottom right corner:) Cum gratia et privi:/legio decennali, A. Ort. [In friendship, with a ten year privilege by Abraham Ortelius]

Plate size: 380 x 497 mm
Scale: 1 : 500,000
Identification number: Ort 64

Remarks: when I published the book "Ortelius Atlas Maps" in 1996, I encouraged readers to send me information on new plates and new states not described in my book. As a result, I have received much information on new states and found quite a few myself as well, which have meanwhile been incorporated on this website.
However, inventive and meticulous research by Joe Q. Walker has demonstrated that I postulated too many new plates, rather than too few.
When I postulated in 1996 a new plate Ort 64 Leodiensis, my main argument for deciding that this was a new plate consisted of the fact that this offprint Ort 64 showed small blocks of diagonal hachuring, where Ort 63 showed vertical hachuring. I assumed that it was technically not feasible to erase such small patches of vertical hachuring on the copperplate and replace these patches with diagonal hachuring. The observation was correct but the conclusion was wrong. Walker has demonstrated that the new hachuring was applied on top of the old one. He also demonstrates that plate blemishes such as scratches and spurious dots occurring on Ort 63 also occurred on plate Ort 64. Therefore, the existence of a separate plate Ort 64 cannot be upheld. Walker has published the arguments leading to this conclusion in detail in a monograph "The Maps of Ortelius and their Variants", Antiquarian Maps Research Monographs - 1, which can be obtained from him on request through Email Martran@msn.com
I am happy that I have been informed about this research, since it increases our knowledge on Ortelius' maps.

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