Cancer, Amid a Crowded Sky
Johannes Hevelius, 1690
$270
Print check at 24 x 18 in: 201 dpi, excellent. Fills the print edge to edge.
Shipping to a US address: $25.90 for this piece, from the print room in Charlotte, North Carolina.
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Johannes Hevelius's Firmamentum Sobiescianum sive Uranographia (1690), published a year after his death by his wife and astronomical collaborator Elisabeth Koopman Hevelius, is the last great naked-eye star atlas — Hevelius insisted on cataloguing star positions with his own precision sextants from a rooftop observatory in Gdańsk even after telescopic sighting instruments existed, distrusting the lenses of his day more than his own trained vision. This plate crowds Cancer, the zodiac crab, between Gemini's twins Castor and Pollux, a roaring Leo, and the faint modern constellations Lynx and Sextans that Hevelius himself invented to fill the gaps between older figures. What to notice: every constellation figure here is drawn as it would appear from outside the celestial sphere looking in — mirror-reversed from the sky as any observer actually sees it, the period convention for a globe-maker's working reference.
- Maker
- Johannes Hevelius
- Date
- 1690
- Medium of the original
- Plate
- Original held by
- Wikimedia Commons
- Credit
- Wikimedia Commons
- Rights
- Public domain, verified
- Catalogue number
- PA-00267
| Picture | 24 x 18 in |
|---|---|
| Outside size | 25.6 x 19.6 in |
| Depth | 0.9 in (22 mm) |
| Weight | [[REAL PROOF NEEDED: shipped weight per size and frame]] |
| Hanging | [[REAL PROOF NEEDED: hanging hardware Prodigi fits to this frame]] |
| Material | Enhanced matte art paper, 200 gsm; acrylic glazing |
| Made in | Charlotte, North Carolina, by Prodigi |
Before a size goes on sale, the file is measured against it: pixels per inch at that size, how much of the picture a crop would lose, tone and sharpness. A size that fails is not offered, so there is nothing to choose wrong.
| Size | dpi | Grade | How it fits |
|---|---|---|---|
| 10 x 8 in | 453 | Excellent | Trimmed 6.3% |
| 14 x 11 in | 329 | Excellent | Trimmed 4.6% |
| 16 x 12 in | 302 | Excellent | Edge to edge |
| 20 x 16 in | 226 | Excellent | Trimmed 6.3% |
| 24 x 18 in | 201 | Excellent | Edge to edge |
| 30 x 24 in | 151 | Good | Trimmed 6.3% |
| Size | Why |
|---|---|
| 12 x 8 in | Wrong shape: a 11% crop |
| 18 x 12 in | Wrong shape: a 11% crop |
| 24 x 16 in | Wrong shape: a 11% crop |
| 30 x 20 in | Wrong shape: a 11% crop |
| 36 x 24 in | Wrong shape: a 11% crop |
| 40 x 30 in | 120 dpi; a historical scan is never enlarged |
| 48 x 36 in | 100 dpi; a historical scan is never enlarged |
| 60 x 40 in | Wrong shape: a 11% crop |
- Scanned
- 2026-10-07
- Master file
- 4,839 x 3,629 px, srgb, sRGB IEC61966-2.1
- Tone
- Darks 132, lights 228 of 255; 0% clipped light, 0% clipped dark
- Colour
- 0% vivid
- Sharpness
- 12.46
- Notes
- Neutrals lean warm (yellow): the paper and varnish of the original, kept as scanned
Shipping for this piece to a US address is $25.90, the print room’s own rate, charged per piece. Checkout shows the total before you pay.
Every piece is printed after you order it, in Charlotte, North Carolina, and ships from there. For now we ship to US addresses only.
A piece that arrives damaged, misprinted or in the wrong size is replaced at our cost. The details: shipping and returns and replacements.
Cabinet of Curiosities
The old world’s book of wonders, for your wall.
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