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Very Rare "Peep Show" Celestial Atlas

Transparent Constellation Plates

The Atlas Céleste by Franz Niklaus König shows represents the constellations through a series of beautifully produced transparent plates. Each plate can be held up to the light (perhaps even at night by moonlight) to discern the pattern of stars forming a given constellation.

König's celestial plates were created at an interesting point when celestial maps - based on telescopic observations - were being filled with an increasing number of stars, leaving little room to illustrate the traditional mythological constellation figures. As celestial maps were transforming into the sober instruments of modern science, a need existed for a pedagogical tool to assist young people in appreciation and study of the stars. Enter Konig's novel interactive Atlas Céleste, which must have created a minor sensation when they were first issued.

Of Optical Toys, Peep Shows, and Scientific Education

The 1820s saw a proliferation of optical curiosities and toys. Devices such as the thaumatrope, the phenakistiscope, and the zootrope, all prefigured the advent of photography, yet seem to incorporate an emerging understanding of how human vision could be manipulated, particularly in creating the illusion of motion. Historians see such optical toys as progenitors of the cinema. Jonathan Crary, in his now classic Techniques of the Observer (MIT Press, 1990), went so far as to posit that the 1820s saw the observer "became the site of new discourses and practices that situated vision within the body as a physiological event."  The present exquisite semi-transparent astronomical views, issued in 1826 by Franz König, would seem to fit into this emerging field of optical technology.

Franz Niklaus König worked as a painter in Switzerland, in Interlaken and Unterseen, from 1797 to 1809. He began to make landscape and costume views using a transparent technique, heightened in watercolor.

According to Thomas Klöti:

The romantically inspired transparent pictures of Franz Niklaus König (1765-1832) were among the widely known attractions of Swiss landscape painting at the beginning of the 19th century. In 1811, König publicly displayed a transparent picture for the first time, which received general acclaim. He established the first "transparent cabinet" in 1815 with eight such works in his apartment at Marktgasse 41 in Bern. The influx to the performances grew to such an extent that he was encouraged to present his art in various cities of Switzerland (Zurich, Winterthur, St. Gallen) as well as in southern Germany (Lindau, Munich, Augsburg, Erlangen, Frankfurt, Ludwigsburg, and Stuttgart) in 1816 and 1817. His tour took him to the court of the King of Württemberg.

König used a similar technique for his until now hardly known transparent constellations. The constellation atlas comprises "27 numbered sheets with star constellations lithographed in white on a black background, made transparent... The backside is covered with thinner paper. A side strip is glued on, usually containing the names of constellations on the image side and a brief description of the content on the reverse side.

The constellations can be viewed in reflected light, the stars themselves in transmitted light, requiring no other aids besides the light source. The viewer can step under the starry sky with the star chart in hand and, in its light, bring the image of the sky to life. It is also conceivable that the plates were viewed in peep boxes.

The work generally includes a preface by the Bernese professor of mathematics and physics Friedrich Trechsel and usually also a dedication page to Grand Duchess Anna Feodorovna of Russia (the princess was the owner of the Elfenau estate in Bern) [text intro not present]

König most likely used the French-language 2nd edition of Flamsteed's celestial atlas (1776) as a model for his "Atlas céleste," whose star catalog is calculated for the year 1780.

Plate List

• [pl. 1.1] : Planisphère pour les principales alignements des étoiles (1826)
• [pl. 1.2] : Hemisphere Boreal [Planisphère avec constellations] (1826)
• pl. 2 : Le renne, le giraffe, la p.te ourse, la grande ourse, le bouvier, le cigne, le dragon, Hercule, le lézard, Cephée, Cassiopée (1826)
• pl. 3 : La giraffe, Persée, Cassiopée, Andromede, le belier, la mouche, les triangles, le poisson boreal, les pleyades, la tête de Meduse (1826)
• pl. 4 : La giraffe, le lynx, la grande ourse, le cocher d'Ericton, les gemeaux, Cassiopée, Persée (1826)
• pl. 6 [i.e. 5] : La grande ourse, le lynx, les gemeaux, le cancer, le petit lion, le lion (1826)
• pl. 6 : La grande ourse, le lynx, le cancer, le petit lion, les levriers le dragon (1826)
• pl. 7 : Les levriers, la grande ourse, le grand lion, la chévelure de Bérénice, le Bouvier, le serpent, la courone, Hercule (1826)
• pl. 8 : Hercule, la courone, le bouvier, le serpent, le serpentaire, le rameau de Cerbere la lyre (1826)
• pl. 9 : Le serpentaire, Hercule, le serpent, la balance, le scorpion, le sagitaire, l'ecu de Sobieski (1826)
• pl. 10 : Le renard, le fleche, loye, l'aigle, Antinous, le rameau de Cerbere, serpentaire, l'ecu de Sobieski, le sagitaire, le capricorne, le verseau, le pt. cheval, le dauphin (1826)
• pl. 11 : Cephée, le cigne, le dragon, Hercule, la lyre, le renard, l'oye, la fleche, Pegase, le lezard, Cassiopée (1826)
• pl. 12 : Le lezard, le cigne, le renard, le poisson austral, Pegase, le pt. cheval, le dauphin, Andromede (1826)
• pl. 15 [i.e. 13] : Persée, la mouche, le belier, les triangles, Andromede, le poisson boreal, la baleine, taureau (1826)
• pl. 14 : Le cocher, Persée, tête de Meduse, mouche, belier, la baleine, Orion, l'eridan, le taureau, la licorne, les gemeaux (1826)
• pl. 13 [i.e. 15] : Le lynx, les gemeaux, le cocher, le taureau, le petit chien, la licorne, l'Orion, l'hydre, le cancer (1826)
• pl. 16 : Le petit lion, le lynx, les gemeaux la licorne, l'Hydre, le cancer, le petit chien, le lion (1826)
• pl. 17 : Le petit lion, le g.nd lion, le cancer, la coupe, le sextans, l'Hydre, la vierge, la chevelure de Bernice (1826)
• pl. 18 : Le bouvier, la vierge, le lion, la coupe, l'Hydre, le corbeau, la balance (1826)
• pl. 19 : La balance, le serpentaire, le scorpion, le loup, le centaure, la vierge, l'Hydre (1826)
• pl. 20 : Antinous, l'ecu de Sobieski, le serpentaire, le scorpion, le sagitaire, la capricorne (1826)
• pl. 21 : Pegase, le verseau, le pt. cheval, le dauphin, le capricorne, le poisson boreal, la baleine, les poissons (1826)
• pl. 22 : Les triangles, Andromede, Pegase, la baleine, les poissons, le verseau, le belier (1826)
• pl. 23 : Le belier, la baleine, Pegase, les poissons, l'Eridan (1826)
• pl. 24 : L'Orion, le taureau, la baleine, le lièvre, l'Eridan, le grand chien, la licorne (1826)
• pl. 25 : Le cancer, le pt. chien, la licorne, Orion, le lièvre, le navire grand chien, la columbe, l'Hydre (1826)
• pl. 26 : Le lion, le sextans, le cancer, la licorne, le navire, la coupe, l'Hydre, le corbeau, la vierge (1826)
• pl. 27 : La vierge, le lion, la coupe, le centaure, le corbeau, l'Hydre, la balance (1826)