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Description:This original copper plate engraved antique map of the Canton of Aargau, Switzerland by Gerard Mercator was published by Henricus Hondius in the early 1628 French edition of Gerard Mercators Atlas.These maps, published in the early editions of Mercators atlas, are the original maps drawn and engraved by Gerald Mercator in the mid to late 16th century, published by his son Rumold as an atlas, after his death, in 1595. After two editions the plates were purchased by Jodocus Hondius in 1604, and continued to be published until the end of the 1630s by Henricus Hondius, when some of the plates were re-engraved and updated with the help of Jan Jansson.
General Definitions:Paper thickness and quality: - Heavy and stablePaper color : - off whiteAge of map color: -Colors used: -General color appearance: -Paper size: - 21in x 17in (530mm x 430mm)Plate size: - 18 1/2in x 14in (475mm x 350mm)Margins: - Min 1/2in (12mm)
Imperfections:Margins: - Light age toningPlate area: - Light toning along centerfoldVerso: - Light age toning
Background: The area of Aargau and the surrounding areas were controlled by the Helvetians, a member of the Celts, as far back as 200 BC, eventually being occupied by the Romans and then by the 6th century, the Franks. The Romans built a major settlement called Vindonissa, near the present location of Brugg.The reconstructed Old High German name of Aargau is Argowe, first unambiguously attested (in the spelling Argue) in 795. The term described a territory only loosely equivalent to that of the modern canton, including the region between Aare and Reuss, including Pilatus and Napf, i.e. including parts of the modern cantons of Berne (Bernese Aargau, Emmental, parts of the Bernese Oberland), Solothurn, Basel-Landschaft, Lucerne, Obwalden and Nidwalden, but not the parts of the modern canton east of the Reuss (Baden District), which were part of Zürichgau.Within the Frankish Empire (8th to 10th centuries), the area was a disputed border region between the duchies of Alamannia and Burgundy. A line of the von Wetterau (Conradines) intermittently held the countship of Aargau from 750 until about 1030, when they lost it (having in the meantime taken the name von Tegerfelden). This division became the ill-defined (and sparsely settled) outer border of the early Holy Roman Empire at its formation in the second half of the 10th century. Most of the region came under the control of the ducal house of Zähringen and the comital houses of Habsburg and Kyburg by about 1200.In the second half of the 13th century, the territory became divided between the territories claimed by the imperial cities of Berne, Lucerne and Solothurn and the Swiss canton of Unterwalden. The remaining portion, largely corresponding to the modern canton of Aargau, remained under the control of the Habsburgs until the conquest of Aargau by the Old Swiss Confederacy in 1415. Habsburg Castle itself, the original seat of the House of Habsburg, was taken by Berne in April 1415. The Habsburgs had founded a number of monasteries (with some structures enduring, e.g., in Wettingen and Muri), the closing of which by the government in 1841 was a contributing factor to the outbreak of the Swiss civil war – the Sonderbund War – in 1847.