The Harmonia Macrocosmica

The Harmonia Macrocosmica is an atlas of the heavens, printed in Amsterdam by Johannes Janssonius (1588 – 1664) in 1660 and 1661. On twenty-nine plates the book shows how people have looked at the sky through the ages: Ptolemy with the Earth at the center, Copernicus with the Sun, and Tycho Brahe with a hybrid. Alongside them are star charts with the constellations of the northern and southern hemispheres and a Christian starry sky. The maker was Andreas Cellarius, rector of the Latin School in Hoorn.

An atlas with a story

According to Robert van Gent, Cellarius began work on it before 1647. The book was meant as a historical introduction to a two-part work on cosmography, and as a supplement to Janssonius's Atlas Novus. The second part never appeared. The twenty-nine plates are double-folio copperplate engravings, colored by hand. Ten of them are signed by Johannes van Loon; the others are anonymous. Who designed them, we do not know.

The title page

The title page was engraved by Frederik Hendrik van den Hove (1628/29 – 1698) and measures about 26.5 by 43 centimeters. Tycho Brahe sits on the left and Copernicus on the right. We also see Urania, the muse of astronomy, Ptolemy, King Alfonso X of Castile and Philips Lansbergen. The design largely follows the title page of Lansbergen's Tabulae Motuum Coelestium Perpetuae from 1632.

The plates

Ten images from the atlas, numbered according to Robert van Gent's count. Click a plate to enlarge it.

Plate 1: a round diagram of the universe according to Ptolemy. The Earth is at the center, surrounded by rings for the planets and by the zodiac; at lower left and at lower right sits a figure, each with globes and instruments. — The Earth stands still at the center, surrounded by the four elements and the seven planetary spheres. For centuries this was the picture of the universe that almost everyone accepted.
**Planisphaerium Ptolemaicum** (plate 1) · Andreas Cellarius, Harmonia Macrocosmica (Amsterdam, Janssonius, 1660; according to Stanford possibly a 1708 impression) · Stanford University Libraries, Glen McLaughlin Map Collection of California as an Island · Public domain (Public Domain Mark) · Source

Plate 4: a round diagram of the universe according to Copernicus. The Sun is at the center, with rings for the planets and the zodiac around them; at lower right sits Copernicus with a globe and instruments. — Here the Sun stands at the center, and the Earth with its Moon and the other planets circle around it. At lower right sits Copernicus, with a globe and instruments.
**Planisphaerium Copernicanum** (plate 4) · Andreas Cellarius, Harmonia Macrocosmica (Amsterdam, Janssonius, 1660) · Stanford University Libraries, Glen McLaughlin Map Collection of California as an Island · Public domain (Public Domain Mark) · Source

Plate 6: a round diagram of the universe according to Tycho Brahe, surrounded by the zodiac. At lower left and right, figures sit with globes, compasses and other instruments in front of ruins. — Tycho Brahe kept the Earth at the center, with the Moon and the Sun circling it, while the other planets circle the Sun. That way he held on to the old picture and still took something from Copernicus. This plate was engraved in 1656.
**Planisphaerium Braheum** (plate 6) · Andreas Cellarius, Harmonia Macrocosmica (Amsterdam, Janssonius, 1660; according to Stanford possibly a 1708 impression) · Stanford University Libraries, Glen McLaughlin Map Collection of California as an Island · Public domain (Public Domain Mark) · Source

Plate 8: a round diagram with the Earth at the center and the planets as medallions on their orbits, inside a ring with the images of the zodiac; below, scholars sit among globes. — In this model Mercury and Venus circle the Sun, which itself circles the Earth; this explains why those two are always seen close to the Sun. The drawing is a copy of a diagram from a medieval manuscript, the Carolingian Leiden Aratea of the ninth century, which once belonged to Hugo Grotius. Because that manuscript contains the poems of Aratus, the model was attributed to him, although it does not come from him.
**Planisphaerium Arateum** (plate 8) · Andreas Cellarius, Harmonia Macrocosmica (1661), scan: R.H. van Gent · Public domain · Source

Plate 15: a ring with the twelve signs of the zodiac around a small map of the northern hemisphere, with lines in the ring connecting the signs; in the corners are angels with banners and two small diagrams. — Lines in the ring show how planets can stand in relation to one another: together, opposite one another, or at an angle of 60, 90 or 120 degrees. In 1660 astrology was still part of astronomy; whoever calculated planets often did so in order to interpret their influence as well. This plate is signed by Johannes van Loon.
**Typus Aspectuum, Oppositionum et Coniunctionum** (plate 15) · Andreas Cellarius, Harmonia Macrocosmica (Amsterdam, Janssonius, 1660) · Stanford University Libraries, Glen McLaughlin Map Collection of California as an Island · Public domain (Public Domain Mark) · Source

Plate 19: the Earth at the center among clouds, around it eight positions of the Moon, with the Sun, drawn with a face, at the top; at lower left a table with the names of the lunar phases and at lower right a second diagram with sunbeams. — The Moon stands in eight positions around the Earth, with the Sun at the top; the dark part of each moon is shown with hatching. At lower left are the names of the phases, and at lower right a second diagram shows how sunlight strikes the Moon. This plate, too, is signed by Van Loon.
**Typus Selenographicus Lunae Phases** (plate 19) · Andreas Cellarius, Harmonia Macrocosmica (Amsterdam, Janssonius, 1660) · Stanford University Libraries, Glen McLaughlin Map Collection of California as an Island · Public domain (Public Domain Mark) · Source

Plate 22: a hemisphere of the starry sky in which figures from the Bible replace the constellations: among them a large ship, an ark, a pope and kings, amid clouds and angels. — In 1627 Julius Schiller, in his *Coelum stellatum christianum*, replaced the pagan constellations with biblical and Christian figures, such as apostles, Mary, Saint Peter's boat and Noah's Ark. Cellarius included that sky, in two hemispheres; this is the first.
**Coeli Stellati Christiani Haemisphaerium Prius** (plate 22) · Andreas Cellarius, Harmonia Macrocosmica (1661), scan: R.H. van Gent · Public domain · Source

Plate 23: the second hemisphere of the Christian starry sky, with apostles, saints and angels amid clouds; a large cross beam, a curtain of water and two small sky charts at the bottom. — The second hemisphere of Schiller's Christian sky. Next to each figure, small letters give the name of the constellation it replaces: Saint Andrew stands in the place of Taurus, and Saint Joseph in that of Orion.
**Coeli Stellati Christiani Haemisphaerium Posterius** (plate 23) · Andreas Cellarius, Harmonia Macrocosmica (1661), scan: R.H. van Gent · Public domain · Source

Plate 24: the northern sky as a circular chart with the classical constellations drawn as colored figures, among them the Great Bear, the Lion, the Crab and Andromeda, against a background of clouds. — The classical constellations of the northern hemisphere, drawn as figures: the Great Bear, Perseus, Boötes, the Dragon and the zodiac along the edge.
**Haemisphaerium Stellatum Boreale Antiquum** (plate 24) · Andreas Cellarius, Harmonia Macrocosmica (1661), scan: R.H. van Gent · Public domain · Source

Plate 27: the southern sky as a circular chart with constellations as colored figures, among them a ship, a whale, a centaur and a large fish, against a background of clouds. — The southern hemisphere of the sky, with among others the ship Argo, Centaurus and the Whale. It also includes constellations that Dutch seafarers only recorded around 1600, such as the Peacock, the Crane and the Toucan.
**Haemisphaerium Stellatum Australe Antiquum** (plate 27) · Andreas Cellarius, Harmonia Macrocosmica (1661), scan: R.H. van Gent · Public domain · Source

Printings and editions

After the first printing of 1660/61 another edition appeared around 1680 or later. In 1694 Gerard Valk and Pieter Schenk bought the copperplates; in 1708 they published the atlas again, mostly without the introduction and commentary and with more subdued colors than the first printings.

See for yourself

The images on this page come from two sources. Plates 1, 4, 6, 15 and 19 are scans from Stanford University Libraries (Public Domain Mark); plates 8, 22, 23, 24 and 27 are scans by Robert van Gent of the 1661 edition (public domain). Below each plate it says which. We have only cropped and resized them; nothing in the image itself has been changed. All twenty-nine plates are on Robert van Gent's website (Utrecht University).

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