From the Atlas De L'europe by Philippe Vandermaelen (1828– 1833) to The

From the Atlas de l’Europe by Philippe Vandermaelen (1828 – 1833) to the Weiss Map by Thomas Best Jervis (1854). The Role of the Établissement géographique de Bruxelles in the Map Production of European Turkey1 Wouter Bracke [0000-0002-4656-6208] Royal Library of Belgium, Brussels, Belgium – [email protected] Abstract: This paper discusses the role of Philippe Vandermaelen (1795-1869) and his Établissement géographique de Bruxelles in the mapping of Turkey in Europe in the 19th century. After a short presentation of the Brussels Institute up to the 1850s, and of its connection with the family of Thomas Best Jervis (1797-1857), first director of the British Topographical and Statistical Department, the paper first addresses the context of the publication of the Atlas de l’Europe by the Belgian cartographer, in particular its first instalment dedicated to European Turkey (1829), and offers an overview of later publications on the subject. After this it focuses on Franz von Weiss’s map of the area (1829-1830), Jervis’s reproduction of the Weiss map (1854), and Vandermaelen’s role in the latter’s production. Keywords: Philippe Vandermaelen, Thomas Best Jervis, Franz von Weiss, Crimean War, European Turkey, History of cartography Vandermaelen’s Etablissement géographique de About a decennium later the United States discovered the Bruxelles and the Jervis family Atlas. After this first success, and in response to some In the first half of 1830, only months before the revolution criticisms arguing the scale he had used for his Atlas which would lead to the creation of Belgium, Philippe universel was too small to represent all geographical Vandermaelen (1795-1869), autodidact geographer, information known about Europe, he decided to publish a founded his Établissement géographique de Bruxelles second atlas, on a larger scale and limited to the Old (Silvestre 2016). By then the Brussels trader in dyes, herbs Continent (Silvestre 2016, p. 54-58). The printing of the and colours was already well introduced to the scientific 165 sheets for this second atlas, together with other milieus in Belgium and abroad, basically thanks to one cartographic projects, asked for more space than the major cartographic enterprise. From 1825 to 1827 he had property in rue du Boulet could offer and Vandermaelen published his Atlas universel de la Géographie physique, looked for a new location for his presses. By the end of politique, statistique et minéralogique de toutes les parties 1829 the decision to build a whole new institute on the du monde. In two years and three months no less than 400 outskirts of Brussels, in Sint-Joost ten Node, had taken sheets in 40 instalments came off the lithographic presses form. Eventually, when the Établissement opened its doors in rue du Boulet where Vandermaelen had installed his in 1830, it comprised, besides the printing atelier and printing business. All sheets had the same scale, and could engraving shop, an ethnographic museum, a school, a be assembled so as to form one gigantic globe of 7,75 m library and a reading room, a national history gallery, a diameter. This publication was eagerly followed and documentation centre and a botanic garden. The Institute commented on by the major scientists of the time ; from quickly became the nerve centre of an international the start the criticisms were fairly positive and they network for the study of geography in its largest sense. For remained so. In 1825, on Conrad Malte-Brun’s proposal, Vandermaelen, folowing the example of Alexander von Vandermaelen and his lithographer Hippolyte Ode were Humboldt (1769-1859), considered geography to be the elected member of the young Société de géographie in mother of all natural sciences, and cartography was but one Paris. Malte-Brun (1775-1826) was the Society’s first expression of it (Silvestre 2016, p. 410-412). The general secretary and himself the author of a Précis de Établissement, open to all interested in the progress of géographie universelle ou Description de toutes les parties natural sciences, became an obligatory stop for the du monde in 7 volumes (1810-1829). Vandermaelen’s intellectual elite of the time. Visitors left their signature in Atlas was not only a scientific but also a commercial the Institute’s visitors’ book. Some of them did even more; success. Less than two years after the publication of the they donated all kinds of objects to the Institute. From last instalment, over 800 copies were sold all over Europe. 1839 onwards all donations, from visitors, but also from 1 This article benefited from a translation credit from the Université libre de Bruxelles. Proceedings of the International Cartographic Association, 3, 2021. 8th International Symposium of the ICA Commission on the History of Cartography, 21–23 April 2020, Istanbul, Turkey (rescheduled for December 2021, Florence, Italy). This contribution underwent single-blind peer review based on submitted abstracts. https://doi.org/10.5194/ica-proc-3-4-2021 | © Author(s) 2021. CC BY 4.0 License. 2 of 11 colleagues, friends and scholars, were inventoried in a map depot after the French example. But it was the manuscript register kept by Vandermaelen’s son Joseph: Crimean War that would mark a turning point in his [Joseph Vandermaelen], Catalogue de l’ethnographie endeavours to establish such a depot (Bracke 2021). commencé en juillet 1839, [1839-1889] (Collection Gilbert During a visit to Belgium in 1854, he came across two de Cauwer). The visitors’ book and the catalogue are part maps he found to be very useful for the military campaign of the rare sources which remain from the Institute’s in the Crimea: a Russian map of the Crimean peninsula by archives. To these privately kept sources we can add the General Muhkin (1817) and an Austrian map of Turkey in so-called mappothèque, i.e. the Institute’s collection of Greece by Franz von Weiss (1829-1831). For the Secretary cartographic sources Vandermaelen used to make his of State for War he made at his own expenses an English maps, and the impressive card index, both in large part version in colour lithography of the first map and an preserved in the Map Room of the Royal Library of anastatic print of the second. Their production was Belgium. They shed light on the Institute’s central position decisive in convincing the government of the necessity of in scientific and, more generally, intellectual life in the 19th creating a map department within the War Office and in century. Unfortunately, hardly anything has been 1855 Jervis was appointed director of the newly founded preserved of Vandermaelen’s correspondence, which must Topographical and Statistical Department. As for have been enormous, as it formed the solid base of his Vandermaelen, Jervis attributed to the study of geography international network (Meisser 1831). Only five years after a large, humanitarian, scope. His wife, Anne Sarah Paget its creation the administrative almanac of Brussels (1801-1886), was a gifted water colour painter and several describes Vandermaelen’s Institute as follows : botanical pictures from her hand are recorded as having been sent by her daughter in the early 20th century to L’établissement Géographique de Bruxelles, fondé en different botanical societies, amongst which The Torrey 1830 par Ph. Vandermaelen, a rassemblé, à l’aide d’une Botanical Society and The Royal Botanic Garden in correspondance ramifiée sur tous les points du globe, une Edinburgh (Berry 1905, p. 14 ; Noltie 2016). At the age of foule de matériaux qui représentent ce que les hommes les 21, Annie Eliza Scott Jervis (1834-1915) translated plus instruits ont fait jusqu’ici d’inédit pour les sciences, Layard’s narrative of the first Crimean campaign : Austen l’industrie, le commerce, etc. ; en un mot la prospérité Henry Layard, La première campagne de Crimée publique qui ne vit que de faits bien constatés et (Bruxelles 1855) into French. In the preface to her book on d’expériences irréfragables. La propagation de ces vérités the early death of her son she writes she inherited from her utiles, tel est le but unique de l’établissement mother ‘a great love of natural scenery and of art’ (Jervis géographique de Bruxelles. 1882); she is mentioned in The Naturalists’ Directory of 1892, p. 109, as is her brother William. William was a (Almanach administratif 1835, p. 153) graduate from the Royal School of Mines in London ; in 1862 he became Director of the Royal Industrial Museum By 1835 Vandermaelen had definitely abandoned all his of Torino. He is mentioned on his father’s map of the other professional activities to focus himself entirely on Crimea of 1854 for his contribution to the geological map the Institute’s mission. The following decennia his of the area which was published as an inset on the map. In cartographic production concentrated on the mapping of 1857, after Thomas Best’s demise, the family moved to Belgium. In 1851 he presented one of his major Brussels for some time where William continued his achievements, the topographical map of Belgium on a geological studies. At the Établissement he classified a scale of 1 to 80.000, at the World exposition of London, collection of animal fossils (Silvestre 2016, p. 310). the Great Exhibition of the Works of Industry of All Nations at Hyde Park. Thomas Best Jervis’s short-lived career as director of the Topographical and Statistical Department, from 1855 to In the second half of the 1850s the Jervis family visited the 1857, is intimately related to the Crimean War. Most of his Institute and remained in contact with its director maps can be traced to Vandermaelen’s mappothèque, afterwards. In the Institute’s archives we find the visiting where some have received the vignette ‘Jervis’ (inv.

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