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Description

Finely engraved allegorical image of Geometria, created by famed Antwerp engraver Hieronymus Cock in 1570.

The image shows three figures hunched over a globe, which is oriented with Florida, Central American and the Caribbean at the center of image.  Geometria, a young woman, uses compasses to measure the globe, while studied closely by two male figures, with various measuring devices in the foreground together with several large books.

This is one of seven prints by of the liberal arts was published by Hieronymus Cock in Antwerp in 1565.  This is plate 6 of the Seven Liberal Arts engravings by Cornelis Cort, after a series of lost paintings by Frans Floris made for the villa of Antwerp merchant and art collector Nicolaas Jongelinck in about 1557.

A later version of the image exists, with the #5.

Frans Floris I was one of the more prominent members of the Floris family, which produced many artists including his father and brother. Painter, draughtsman and etcher, Floris was one of the leading exponents of Romanism in Antwerp, and his history painting influenced a generation of Flemish artists. He was largely responsible for the introduction of studios organized in the Italian manner, with skilled assistants — a practice subsequently adopted by other Netherlandish artists, including Rubens.

Cornelis Cort was a Dutch painter and engraver. He was a student of Hieronymus Cock, then went to Venice and studied with Titian. After several years there, he went to Rome where he founded an engraving studio and made important engravings after Italian, Flemish, and German engravings. He also mentored other engravers.

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Hieronymus Cock Biography

Hieronymus Cock (1518-1570) was a skilled Flemish engraver, painter, and publisher of prints in the sixteenth century. He hailed from an artistic family, as his father and brother were both painters as well. He trained as a painter in Antwerp and then spent time in Rome (1546-7).

Cock and his wife, Volcxken Diercx, established their publishing house in 1548 at Aux quatre vents, or at the house of the four winds. Cock’s publishing house became renowned in northern Europe as he and his wife, and successor, transformed printmaking from an individual activity to one based on a division of labor. This allowed him to publish more than 1,100 prints in just over two decades (1548-1570). He is known to have personally etched 62 plates.

Cock’s cartographic output included country maps, landscape prints, and town plans, especially of cities under siege. He also worked with mapmakers; for example, he collaborated with Diego Gutiérrez on a 1562 map of the America. He famously released prints by important engravers who produced works after the Italian masters of the Renaissance, popularizing that movement in the north of Europe.