Matthäus Merian

Matthäus Merian der Ältere (the Elder) was a Swiss-born engraver who worked for most of his career in Frankfurt, where he also ran a publishing house. A member of a patrician family in Basel, he studied the art of copperplate engraving in Zurich before moving to Oppenheim, Germany, where he worked for and became the son-in-law of the publisher Johann Theodor de Bry, eventually taking over the firm. In 1626, he became a citizen of Frankfurt-am-Main and became an independent publisher. He is most known as the publisher of Topographie Germaniae (1621–1687), a 21-volume work with maps, town plans, and views of places in Germany as well as maps of other countries and of the world. The German travel magazine Merian is named after him.