A pair of superb 17th century celestial hemispheres

A beautiful part of celestial charts, with the constellations superimposed over the northern and southern hemispheres of Earth. In the top corners of both plates the title is on banderoles held aloft by cherubs and demons. The bottom corners have representations of astronomers and their pupils, holding scientific instruments. These charts were published in the 'Atlas Coelestis; seu Harmonia Macrocosmica', the only celestial atlas to be produced in the Netherlands before the nineteenth century. It was a compilation of maps of the Ptolemaic universe and the more modern theories of Copernicus and Brahe, and remains the finest and most highly decorative celestial atlas ever produced. It was originally published by Jan Jansson in 1660: this chart comes from Schenk & Valk's reissue.