1852 Meyer Map of Asia
Asien-meyer-1852

Title
1852 (dated) 8 x 9.5 in (20.32 x 24.13 cm) 1 : 55000000
Description
As this map was drawn, Imperial China wilted under the weak Qing while the Russian attained the height of its pan-continental expansion. Turkey and much of the Middle East was under Ottoman hegemony. In India, shortly after this map was made, in 1857, the sepoys of the British East Indian Company would revolt in India's First War of Independence, which would lead to the collapse of the British east India Company and the consolidation of India under the suzerainty of the British Raj.
This map was issued in Meyer's Zeitung Atlas. Although all the maps in this atlas are not individually dated, the title page and maps were often updated while the imprint with the date was not, causing confusion to the exact date for some of the maps. Moreover some maps in the atlas were taped in at a later date as an update to the atlas. We have dated the maps in this collection to the best of our ability.
Cartographer
Joseph Meyer (May 9, 1796 - June 27, 1856) was a German industrialist and publisher, most notably for the encyclopedia Meyers Conversation-Lexicon. Born in Gotha, Germany, Meyer was educated as a merchant in Frankfurt am Main. He moved to London in 1816, but returned to Germany in a820 after his stock speculations and business adventures fell through. Once back in Germany, he began by investing in the textile trade (1820-24). Meyer began creating business plans concerning how to start railways soon after the first steam-hauled railway began operation in December 1835. He founded the Deutsche Eisenbahnschienen-Compangie auf Actien (German Railway Rail joint stock company) in 1845. Meyer also found great success as a publisher, utilizing the system of serial subscriptions to publications, a new idea for the time. He founded a company, Bibliographisches Institut in Gotha in 1825, which published several versions of the Bible, works of classical literature, atlases, the world in pictures on steel engravings, and an encyclopedia.