This map of the Alsace consists of two plates. The larger plate (34x50cm) is the left plate of Van den Keere’s map of the Rhine. Visscher used the 1622 state for his map. The map remained unchanged until this 1632 state, when the date 1632 was added after his signature, bottom left of the map page. Visscher also etched a smaller plate (8x50cm) with portraits, town views and the continuation of the map title. This smaller strip was added below the larger map plate.
The title runs along the upper and lower edges of the map plate. In the lower left of the map is a bar scale, followed by the imprint: CJ Visscher excudebat A1632. The bottom plate consists of two portraits and seven town views: LEOPOLDUS Archidux Austriae (portrait) BASEL, STRASBURG, SPEIR, WORMBS, MENTZ, BACHARACH, COBLENTZ, ERNESTUS Comes Mansfeldiae (portrait)
CLAES JANSZ. VISSCHER 1587-1652 – NICOLAES VISSCHER I (son) 1618-79 NICOLAES VISSCHER II (grandson) 1649-1702For nearly a century the members of the Visscher family were important art dealers and map publishers in Amsterdam. The founder of the business, C. J. Visscher, had premises near to those of Pieter van den Keere and Jodocus Hondius, whose pupil he may have been. From about 1620 he designed a number of individual maps, including one of the British Isles, but his first atlas consisted of maps printed from plates bought from van den Keere and issued as they stood with some additions of his own, including historical scenes of battles and sieges for which he had a high reputation. Some maps bear the Latinised form of the family name: Piscator. After Visscher’s death his son and grandson, both of the same name, issued a considerable number of atlases, constantly revised and brought up to date but most of them lacking an index and with varying contents. The widow of Nicholaes Visscher II carried on the business until it finally passed into the hands of Pieter Schenk
