April 6, 1528

Albrecht Durer; (May 21, 1471 to April 6, 1528) was a German painter, and master of other skills also, like printmaking. He was born in Nuremburg, and widely traveled. One of his lesser known accomplishments, was creating woodcuts of the northern and southern hemisphere stars. These pictures now may seem a bit frilly to modern eyes, with their drawings of lions and bulls, but this is merely our own provincialism. The star maps were created for Emperor Maximilian I, ca 1515. Durer's representation of the celestial spheres were "part of a landmark collaboration between Dürer, German astronomer Conrad Heinfogel and cartographer and astronomer Johan Stabis."