DE JODE Gerard

(c. 1509 Nimwegen – Antwerp 1591)

Printer, cartographer and engraver born in Nimwegen, the oldest city in the Netherlands.
He moved to Antwerp where he is cited in the guild list of San Luca in 1547.
Contemporary of Abraham Ortelius, engraver and printer in the same city of Antwerp, he was in continuous competition with him especially for cartographic activity. Beginning in 1560, Gerard De Jode quickly published maps of several countries, some engraved by him and others by engravers active in his workshop, in addition to a large number of prints of historical or sacred subject matter.

In 1573 many of its maps were collected in a single volume (titled Speculum Orbis Terrarum), published several years later in 1578, exclusively assigned to Ortelius since 1570 with the “monopoly” of the publication of Atlases.
Together with Ortelius, De Jode is considered to be one of the most important cartographic engravers, although, contrary to Ortelius, he was almost completely forgotten in the following centuries.

Unlike Ortelius and Mercator, prolific printers and cartographers, De Jode’s geographic prints are rarer and more sought-after by collectors.