  willem janszoon blaeu (157121 october 1638), also abbreviated to willem jansz. blaeu, was a dutch cartographer, atlas maker and publisher. ==biography== blaeu was born at uitgeest or alkmaar. as the son of a well-to-do herring salesman, he was destined to succeed his father in the trade, but his interests lay more in mathematics and astronomy. between 1594 and 1596 as a student of the danish astronomer tycho brahe he qualified as an instrument and globe maker. once he returned to the netherlands, he made country maps and world globes, and as he possessed his own printing works, he was able to regularly produce country maps in an atlas format, some of which appeared in the atlas novus published in 1635. in 1633 he was appointed map-maker of the dutch east india company. he was also an editor and published works of willebrord snell, descartes, adriaan metius, roemer visscher, gerhard johann vossius, barlaeus, hugo grotius, vondel and the historian and poet pieter corneliszoon hooft. he died in amsterdam. he had two sons, johannes and cornelis blaeu, who continued their father's mapmaking and publishing business after his death in 1638. prints of the family's works are still sold today. original maps are rare collector items. the dutch painter johannes vermeer of delft (1632-1675) holds a position of great honor among map historians. several of his paintings illustrate maps hanging on walls or globes standing on tables or cabinets. vermeer painted these cartographical documents with such detail that it is often possible to identify the actual maps. evidently, vermeer was particularly attached to a willem blaeu - balthasar florisz van berckenrode map of holland and west friesland, as he represented it as a wall decoration in three of hi
1571_births 1638_deaths 16th-century_cartographers 17th-century_cartographers Dutch_cartographers People_from_Alkmaar People_from_Uitgeest People_of_the_Dutch_Golden_Age