{"title":"Sky \u0026 Cosmos: Historical Star Charts","description":"\u003cp\u003eLong before anyone had been up there, the sky was mapped anyway — by people who could only look. A comet stitched into linen a few years after Hastings. Two rival pictures of the universe, printed side by side in Amsterdam while the argument was still open, each drawn with the same care by a schoolmaster who was not an astronomer.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWhat these sheets record is not the sky. It is the looking: what it was possible to believe about the heavens, and when. Every listing names the work, its date, the institution that holds it and its rights status.\u003c\/p\u003e","products":[{"product_id":"bayeux-tapestry-halleys-comet-1066-mug","title":"Bayeux Tapestry: Halley's Comet, 1066 – Porcelain Art Mug","description":"\u003cp\u003eSpring, 1066. A comet blazes across the night sky over England. Men stand rooted to the ground, arms flung upward, unable to look away. \"Isti mirant stella\" — these men marvel at the star — reads the stitched inscription above their heads. A few paces on in the embroidered narrative, King Harold sits at Westminster as a messenger leans close to deliver the news.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThis is Scenes 32–33 of the Bayeux Tapestry: the most celebrated panels of the most famous medieval artwork in existence. Probably commissioned within years of the Norman Conquest by Bishop Odo of Bayeux — William the Conqueror's half-brother — the nearly seventy-metre wool-on-linen chronicle recorded the events of 1066 with dramatic economy. The comet, Halley's, had been observed by chroniclers across Europe and Asia that spring. In the tapestry, it is unambiguously an omen. At Hastings in October, the omen proved correct.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eOn 10 September 2026 the tapestry goes on show at the British Museum in London, in Britain for the first time in more than nine hundred years. The loan runs until 11 July 2027 and the opening months are already sold out. The panel at the centre of the publicity is the one wrapped around this mug.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eReproduced from a photograph of the original eleventh-century embroidery. The wool was dyed with three plants — madder for the reds, woad for the blues, weld for the yellows — and nine hundred years have taken the edge off all three. The colours here have been lifted back so that they read with full intensity on white porcelain.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe fourth product image shows the same scene as Charles Stothard engraved it. The Society of Antiquaries of London sent him to Bayeux in 1816 to copy the whole tapestry; James Basire cut the plates, and their publication in 1821–23 was the first time a complete colour reproduction had been put before the public. Stothard drew the embroidery after the damage of the Revolution and before the nineteenth-century repairs — which is why his plates are still the reference for what is original stitching and what is later mending. One thing he did not draw: a fragment left Bayeux during the campaign and surfaced in London. The South Kensington Museum sent it back on 14 August 1872. Who removed it has never been settled.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eFine Porcelain — 10 oz. Dishwasher and microwave safe.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eBayeux Tapestry, scenes 32–33, wool embroidery on linen, c. 1070s, Bayeux, Normandy. Photograph by Myrabella, 7 March 2013, Wikimedia Commons, released by the photographer into the public domain. Fourth image: Charles Alfred Stothard, \u003cem\u003eThe Tapestry of Bayeux\u003c\/em\u003e, engraved by James Basire, Society of Antiquaries of London, 1821–23; Internet Archive, Public Domain Mark 1.0.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eSelected by Dr. Walther Fuchs for the Tazzarte collection.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Tazzarte","offers":[{"title":"Fine Porcelain — 10 oz","offer_id":57838947303755,"sku":"bd212831-ea2a-4e6a-97d0-dd3534b07b3f","price":34.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0816\/8475\/8859\/files\/f17a3bf6-942d-4c7b-91a2-11f24b650ce3.webp?v=1783751513"},{"product_id":"andreas-cellarius-planisphaerium-ptolemaicum-1661-porcelain-art-mug","title":"Andreas Cellarius: Planisphaerium Ptolemaicum, 1661 – Porcelain Art Mug","description":"\u003cp\u003eAt the centre, the Earth. A small globe of the northern hemisphere — Europe, Asia and Africa named on it — wrapped in a ring of cloud and set inside a band of flame: mundus sublunaris quatuor elementa complectens, the world below the moon that holds the four elements. Around it turn seven spheres, one for each planet the age could see, each with its god driving a chariot through the clouds. The outermost band is the zodiac. Everything moves around the Earth, because in this picture everything does.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe title is cut in half. It stands in two cartouches at the top, and you have to read across the sky to assemble it — left line, right line, left line, right. Even single words break across the gap. The engraver made the reader's eye travel the whole width of the heavens before the sentence closes.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAndreas Cellarius published the Harmonia Macrocosmica in Amsterdam in 1660, and this is its opening plate. Copernicus had been in print for 117 years. Galileo had been tried 27 years earlier. The model was finished, and Cellarius opens with it anyway: the atlas was conceived as a history of ideas, and it sets out the systems of Ptolemy, of Copernicus and of Tycho Brahe side by side, each drawn on its own terms and with the same care. The sheet printed here comes from the issue of 1661; the Copernican plate, three leaves later in the same volume, is its counterpart.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eHe was not an astronomer. Born around 1596 at Neuhausen near Worms, he taught Latin in Amsterdam and The Hague, and from 1637 was rector of the Latin school at Hoorn, housed in a former convent. He died there in the first months of 1665. Where he is buried is not known.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe mug carries the plate whole — both cartouches, the winged figures at the sides, and in the lower corners the two groups of astronomers with their globes, quadrants and cross-staffs. The copy is the one kept in Zurich, coloured by hand.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe fourth product image shows four details at the size they are printed: the Earth held in cloud and fire, the cartouche where the title breaks off mid-word, the chariot of the sun on the via solis, and the astronomer in the lower right corner.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eFine Porcelain — 10 oz. Dishwasher and microwave safe.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAndreas Cellarius, Planisphaerium Ptolemaicum sive machina orbium mundi ex hypothesi Ptolemaica in plano disposita. Plate 1 of the Harmonia Macrocosmica, Amsterdam: Johannes Janssonius, 1661. Zentralbibliothek Zürich, T 12, doi.org\/10.3931\/e-rara-89076. Public Domain Mark.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eSelected by Dr. Walther Fuchs for the Tazzarte collection.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Tazzarte","offers":[{"title":"Fine Porcelain — 10 oz","offer_id":58233920749899,"sku":"260aa195-6acf-48e8-8a3c-c5491dfe299c","price":34.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0816\/8475\/8859\/files\/Cellarius_Ptol_1_front_3000.jpg?v=1787511605"},{"product_id":"andreas-cellarius-planisphaerium-copernicanum-1661-porcelain-art-mug","title":"Andreas Cellarius: Planisphaerium Copernicanum, 1661 – Porcelain Art Mug","description":"\u003cp\u003eAt the centre, the sun — and it has a face. Around it the circles of Mercury and Venus, then the Earth carrying its moon in a small ring of its own, then Mars, then Jupiter with four satellites, then Saturn. The outermost band is the zodiac, twelve fields of cloud with their signs. Nothing here turns around the Earth except the moon.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe title is cut in half, exactly as on the Ptolemaic plate: two cartouches at the top, read left line then right line, and single words break across the gap. The engraver made the reader's eye travel the whole width of the heavens before the sentence closes.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThis is plate four of the Harmonia Macrocosmica, Amsterdam 1661 — three leaves after the Ptolemaic system, in the same volume, drawn by the same hand with the same care. Cellarius set the competing models beside one another and let each make its case. Copernicus had been in print for 117 years; Galileo had been tried 27 years earlier; and the four small discs beside Jupiter are what Galileo saw through his glass in 1610, drawn into the sky fifty years later.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAndreas Cellarius was not an astronomer. Born around 1596 at Neuhausen near Worms, he taught Latin in Amsterdam and The Hague, and from 1637 was rector of the Latin school at Hoorn, housed in a former convent. He died there in the first months of 1665. Where he is buried is not known.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe mug carries the plate whole — both cartouches, the two figures at the sides, and in the lower corners the astronomers: Ptolemy on the left with his globe, and on the right a younger man with an armillary sphere. The copy is the one kept in Zurich, coloured by hand.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe fourth product image shows four details at the size they are printed: the sun with its face, the cartouche where the title breaks off mid-word, Jupiter with its four moons, and the astronomer in the lower right corner.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eFine Porcelain — 10 oz. Dishwasher and microwave safe.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAndreas Cellarius, Planisphaerium Copernicanum sive systema universi totius creati ex hypothesi Copernicana in plano exhibitum. Plate 4 of the Harmonia Macrocosmica, Amsterdam: Johannes Janssonius, 1661. Zentralbibliothek Zürich, T 12, doi.org\/10.3931\/e-rara-89076. Public Domain Mark.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eSelected by Dr. Walther Fuchs for the Tazzarte collection.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Tazzarte","offers":[{"title":"Fine Porcelain — 10 oz","offer_id":58235031322955,"sku":"16affa2e-eaff-43e0-a3ca-dec3cadc90e7","price":34.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0816\/8475\/8859\/files\/Cellarius_Cop_1_front_3000.jpg?v=1787513078"}],"url":"https:\/\/tazzarte.com\/collections\/sky-cosmos-historical-star-charts.oembed","provider":"Tazzarte","version":"1.0","type":"link"}