Jacob van Deventer (cartographer)

Jacob Roelofs van Deventer (c. 1500/1505 in Kampen – 1575 in Cologne) was a Dutch cartographer of the Renaissance. He is today best known for his work in systematically cartographing all Dutch towns and cities of his time.

Little biographical information exists about Jacob van Deventer. His patronage would suggest he was Catholic. Despite his name, he was probably not born in Deventer, but in Kampen in the north of the Netherlands. His mother married a man called Roelof in Deventer in 1510, and Jacob probably grew up there. He first appears in the sources on 24 April 1520, when he enrolled at the University of Leuven under the name of "Jacobus de Daventria". On this basis, his date of birth is conjectured to have been around 1500–1505. In Leuven, Jacob's interests were first directed towards medicine and philosophy, but he then began to take an interest in geography and cartography. he later moved to Mechelen, from where in 1572 he relocated to Cologne to flee the upheavals of the Dutch Revolt against the Spanish rule. During his career as a cartographer in the Spanish royal service, he earned himself the title of "Imperial Cartographer" from emperor Charles V in 1540 (later changed to that of "Royal Cartographer", after the emperor's abdication in 1555).

Jacob van Deventer was among the first to make systematic use of triangulation, a technique whose theory was described by his contemporary Gemma Frisius in his 1533 book, Libellus de locorum describendorum ratione. In 1536 he produced a printed map of Brabant, the first such map to be published in the Netherlands. He then launched into an impressive career as a mapmaker. In 1559, he was tasked by King Philip II with the project that was to become his life's work: the systematic cartography of all cities of the Netherlands. The resulting maps were kept unpublished because of their military value. As a result, they later became forgotten and were rediscovered only in the late 19th century.

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