Antique Maps by Lienhart Holle

Lienhart Holle, also mentioned under the name Leonhart Holl, is considered as the third book printer of the city of Ulm. It is very little known about his life. At least is it verified that he was active in Ulm from 1478 onward.

At the beginning of his activity as a printer he published playing cards. Between 1482 and 1484 several outstanding works of early book printing have been produced in his printing shop. His masterpiece is considered the first atlas printed north of the Alps. The outstanding features of this atlas is extraordinary: The largest Antiqua typeface of the incunabula time, paper of unusual size and strength from Milan and 27 woodcut maps with stunning color. It is the first atlas printed with accompanying text on the verso of the maps and the first atlas with woodcut maps in general.

The blue pigment used by Holle for the colouration of the seas is most probably lapis lazuli, the ultramarine of the Middle Ages and the Renaissance. The price per ounce for the rich blue pigment during the Renaissance correlated with that of gold and was extracted in western Afghanistan.

The exorbitant cost of the production of the atlas led to the bankruptcy of his printing operation. The woodblocks of the maps, the remaining paper and the types passed to Johann Reger, who reissued the atlas in 1486 in a second edition. The colouring of the seas was done with a cheaper brown pigment in the 1486 edition of Reger. Also some of the maps of the second edition can be identified by an additional title on top.

Lienhart Holle died after the year 1492.