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Pluto at Martis Camp showing Milky Way вЂ“ Via Lactea (Photo Chris Kasper 2012) Note the Milky way ( Via Lactea in Latin in the myth of Juno and Hercules or Hera and Heracles) in both the time lapse photo and DГјrerвЂ™s Septentrionales image. I had brought NickвЂ™s beautifully written and illustrated book along for reference вЂ“ he devotes ample space to DГјrerвЂ™s historic work вЂ“ and, as usual, I could not easily put it down. I return to this book frequently, including recently when I was asked to give an invited summer night star talk, вЂњStars in Myth and FactвЂќ, where a devoted group of stargazers gathered under a night sky at over a mile elevation at Martis Camp near Lake Tahoe with a mesmerizing celestial display of stars, a night vista also filled with the Milky Way in a rare event of visual magnificence humbling to us all (see July photo below).

Second, IвЂ™m an admirer of Nick Kanas, whose superb book Star Maps I reviewed in 2007.

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First, IвЂ™ve given lectures where Albrecht DГјrer figures in major ways, including at Stanford University Cantor Center for the Visual Arts (formerly Stanford University Museum) in a series on Renaissance chiaroscuro in 2011. IвЂ™ve found myself poring over these star maps more than a few times in the past several years for different reasons. Historical astronomers have long admired this 1515 illustrated and colored woodcut pair Imagines coeli Septentrionales et Meridionales zodiaci not only for their stunning accuracy of visual representation of the constellations in zodiacal lore but also for their historical significanceВ in acknowledging and honoring ancient astronomers like Aratus, Ptolemy, Marcus Manilius and Al-Sufi as precedents and sources, a form of historiography uncommon even in the Renaissance when documentation began to be more highly appreciated.

His woodcut pair is claimed to be the first printed star map in Europe, justifiable because it was disseminated to an audience wider than only a few scholars, since so many prints could be quickly printed and distributed after the advent of the printing press. But he is also a pioneer illustrator of European star charts, especially his 1515 collaborative work for making a pair of woodcuts of the northern and southern hemisphere night sky images that have graced historical astronomy for half a millennium. Albrecht DГјrerвЂ™s 1515 Imagines coeli Septentrionales (North hemisphere) Star ChartДЄlbrecht DГјrer is an artist famous for multiple endeavors, including woodcut and painting media.

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