The Flammarion engraving is a

wood engraving Wood engraving is a printmaking technique, in which an artist works an image or ''matrix'' of images into a block of wood. Functionally a variety of woodcut, it uses relief printing, where the artist applies ink to the face of the block and ...

by an unknown artist, so named because its first documented appearance is in

Camille Flammarion Nicolas Camille Flammarion FRAS (; 26 February 1842 – 3 June 1925) was a French astronomer and author. He was a prolific author of more than fifty titles, including popular science works about astronomy, several notable early science fiction ...

's 1888 book ("The Atmosphere: Popular Meteorology"). The text is also availabl
here
The wood engraving has often, but erroneously, been referred to as a

woodcut Woodcut is a relief printing technique in printmaking. An artist carves an image into the surface of a block of wood—typically with gouges—leaving the printing parts level with the surface while removing the non-printing parts. Areas that ...

. It has been used as a metaphorical illustration of either the

scientific Science is a systematic endeavor that builds and organizes knowledge in the form of testable explanations and predictions about the universe. Science may be as old as the human species, and some of the earliest archeological evidence for ...

or the

mystical Mysticism is popularly known as becoming one with God or the Absolute, but may refer to any kind of ecstasy or altered state of consciousness which is given a religious or spiritual meaning. It may also refer to the attainment of insight in u ...

quests for knowledge.

Description

The print depicts a man, clothed in a long robe and carrying a staff, who is at the edge of the Earth, where it meets the sky. He kneels down and passes his head, shoulders, and right arm through the star-studded sky, discovering a marvellous realm of circling clouds, fires and suns beyond the heavens. One of the elements of the cosmic machinery bears a strong resemblance to traditional pictorial representations of the " wheel in the middle of a wheel" described in the visions of the Hebrew prophet

Ezekiel Ezekiel (; he, יְחֶזְקֵאל ''Yəḥezqēʾl'' ; in the Septuagint written in grc-koi, Ἰεζεκιήλ ) is the central protagonist of the Book of Ezekiel in the Hebrew Bible. In Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, Ezekiel is acknow ...

. The caption that accompanies the engraving in Flammarion's book reads:

Attribution

In 1957,

astronomer An astronomer is a scientist in the field of astronomy who focuses their studies on a specific question or field outside the scope of Earth. They observe astronomical objects such as stars, planets, natural satellite, moons, comets and galaxy, g ...

Ernst Zinner Ernst Zinner (2 February 1886 in Goldberg, Silesia – 30 August 1970) was a German astronomer and noted historian of astronomy. After studies in Munich and Jena he obtained his PhD in 1907 at the University of Jena, followed by stays at ...

claimed that the image dated to the

German Renaissance The German Renaissance, part of the Northern Renaissance, was a cultural and artistic movement that spread among Germany, German thinkers in the 15th and 16th centuries, which developed from the Italian Renaissance. Many areas of the arts and ...

, but he was unable to find any version published earlier than 1906. Further investigation, however, revealed that the work was a composite of images characteristic of different historical periods, and that it had been made with a burin, a tool used for

only since the late 18th century. The image was traced to Flammarion's book by

Arthur Beer Arthur Beer (28 June 1900 – 20 October 1980) was a German astronomer who worked at Cambridge UniversityObituary: Dr Arthur Beer The Times, Thursday, Oct 23, 1980; pg. 18; Issue 60757; col G Biography He was born in Reichenberg, Bohemia, the ...

, an astrophysicist and historian of German science at

Cambridge Cambridge ( ) is a university city and the county town in Cambridgeshire, England. It is located on the River Cam approximately north of London. As of the 2021 United Kingdom census, the population of Cambridge was 145,700. Cambridge bec ...

and, independently, by Bruno Weber, the curator of rare books at the

Zürich Zürich () is the list of cities in Switzerland, largest city in Switzerland and the capital of the canton of Zürich. It is located in north-central Switzerland, at the northwestern tip of Lake Zürich. As of January 2020, the municipality has 43 ...

central library. Flammarion had been apprenticed at the age of twelve to an engraver in

Paris Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. S ...

and it is believed that many of the illustrations for his books were engraved from his own drawings, probably under his supervision. Therefore, it is plausible that Flammarion himself created the image, though the evidence for this remains inconclusive. Like most other illustrations in Flammarion's books, the engraving carries no attribution. Although sometimes referred to as a forgery or a hoax, Flammarion does not characterize the engraving as a medieval or renaissance woodcut, and the mistaken interpretation of the engraving as an older work did not occur until after Flammarion's death. The decorative border surrounding the engraving is distinctly non-medieval and it was only by cropping it that the confusion about the historical origins of the image became possible. According to Bruno Weber and to astronomer Joseph Ashbrook, the depiction of a spherical heavenly vault separating the Earth from an outer realm is similar to the first illustration in

Sebastian Münster Sebastian Münster (20 January 1488 – 26 May 1552) was a German cartographer and cosmographer. He also was a Christian Hebraist scholar who taught as a professor at the University of Basel. His well-known work, the highly accurate world map, '' ...

's '' Cosmographia'' of 1544, a book which Flammarion, an ardent bibliophile and book collector, might have owned.

Context in Flammarion's book

In Flammarion's ''L'atmosphère: météorologie populaire'', the image refers to the text on the facing page (p. 162), which also clarifies the author's intent in using it as an illustration: The same paragraph had already appeared, ''without'' the accompanying engraving, in an earlier edition of the text published under the title of ''L'atmosphère: description des grands phénomènes de la Nature'' ("The Atmosphere: Description of the Great Phenomena of Nature," 1872). The correspondence between the text and the illustration is so close that one would appear to be based on the other. Had Flammarion known of the engraving in 1872, it seems unlikely that he would have left it out of that year's edition, which was already heavily illustrated. The more probable conclusion therefore is that Flammarion commissioned the engraving specifically to illustrate this particular text, though this has not been ascertained conclusively.

Literary sources

The idea of the contact of a solid sky with the Earth is one that repeatedly appears in Flammarion's earlier works. In his ''Les mondes imaginaires et les mondes réels'' ("Imaginary Worlds and Real Worlds", 1864), he cites a legend of a Christian saint, Macarius the Roman, which he dates to the 6th century. This legend includes the story of three monks (Theophilus, Sergius, and Hyginus) who "wished to discover the point where the sky and the earth touch" (in Latin: ''ubi cœlum terræ se conjungit''). After recounting the legend he remarks that "the preceding monks hoped to go to heaven without leaving the earth, to find 'the place where the sky and the earth touch,' and open the mysterious gateway which separates this world from the other. Such is the cosmographical notion of the universe; it is always the terrestrial valley crowned by the canopy of the heavens." In the legend of St. Macarius, the monks do not in fact find the place where Earth and sky touch. In ''Les mondes imaginaires'' Flammarion recounts another story: Flammarion also mentioned the same story, in nearly the same words, in his ''Histoire du Ciel'' ("History of the Sky"): The ''Letters'' referred to are a series of short essays by

François de La Mothe Le Vayer François de La Mothe Le Vayer (, August 15889 May 1672), was a French writer who was known to use the pseudonym Orosius Tubero. He was admitted to the Académie française in 1639, and was the tutor of Louis XIV. Early years Le Vayer was born a ...

. In letter 89, Le Vayer, after mentioning

Strabo Strabo''Strabo'' (meaning "squinty", as in strabismus) was a term employed by the Romans for anyone whose eyes were distorted or deformed. The father of Pompey was called "Pompeius Strabo". A native of Sicily so clear-sighted that he could see ...

's scornful opinion of

Pytheas Pytheas of Massalia (; Ancient Greek: Πυθέας ὁ Μασσαλιώτης ''Pythéas ho Massaliōtēs''; Latin: ''Pytheas Massiliensis''; born 350 BC, 320–306 BC) was a Greeks, Greek List of Graeco-Roman geographers, geographer, explor ...

's account of a region in the far north where land, sea, and air seemed to mingle in a single gelatinous substance, adds: Le Vayer does not specify who this "anchorite" was, nor does he provide further details about the story or its sources. Le Vayer's comment was expanded upon by Pierre Estève in his ''Histoire generale et particuliere de l'astronomie'' ("General and Particular History of Astronomy," 1755), where he interprets Le Vayer's statement (without attribution) as a claim that Pytheas "had arrived at a corner of the sky, and was obliged to stoop down in order not to touch it." The combination of the story of St. Macarius with Le Vayer's remarks seems to be due to Flammarion himself. It also appears in his ''Les terres du ciel'' ("The Lands of the Sky"):

Later uses and interpretations

The Flammarion engraving appeared in C. G. Jung's ''Flying Saucers: A Modern Myth of Things Seen in the Skies'' (1959). The first color version to be published was made by Roberta Weir and distributed by Berkeley's

Print Mint The Print Mint, Inc. was a major publisher and distributor of underground comix based in the San Francisco Bay Area during the genre's late 1960s-early 1970s heyday. Starting as a retailer of psychedelic posters, the Print Mint soon evolved into ...

in 1970. That color image spawned most of the modern variations that have followed since.

Donovan Donovan Phillips Leitch (born 10 May 1946), known mononymously as Donovan, is a Scottish musician, songwriter, and record producer. He developed an eclectic and distinctive style that blended folk, jazz, pop, psychedelic rock and world mus ...

's 1973 LP, ''

Cosmic Wheels ''Cosmic Wheels'' is the tenth studio album, and eleventh album overall, by British singer-songwriter Donovan. It was released in both the UK (Epic SEPC 65450) and the US (Epic KE 32156) in March 1973. History After the introspection of fath ...

'', used an extended black and white version on its inner sleeve (an artist added elements extending the image to fit the proportions of the record jacket). The image also appeared in "The Compleat Astrologer" (pg. 25) by Derek and Julia Parker in 1971. In 1994, 'The Secret Language of Birthdays' by Gary Goldschneider and Joost Elffers was published featuring this image. The Flammarion engraving appeared on the cover of

Daniel J. Boorstin Daniel Joseph Boorstin (October 1, 1914 – February 28, 2004) was an American historian at the University of Chicago who wrote on many topics in American and world history. He was appointed the twelfth Librarian of the United States Congress in ...

's bestselling history of science ''

The Discoverers ''The Discoverers'' is a non-fiction historical work by Daniel Boorstin, published in 1983, and is the first in the Knowledge Trilogy, which also includes ''The Creators'' and ''The Seekers''. The book, subtitled ''A History of Man's Search to K ...

'', published in 1983. Other books devoted to science that used it as an illustration include ''

The Mathematical Experience ''The Mathematical Experience'' (1981) is a book by Philip J. Davis and Reuben Hersh that discusses the practice of modern mathematics from a historical and philosophical perspective. The book discusses the psychology of mathematicians, and giv ...

'' (1981) by

Philip J. Davis Philip J. Davis (January 2, 1923 – March 14, 2018) was an American academic applied mathematician. Davis was born in Lawrence, Massachusetts. He was known for his work in numerical analysis and approximation theory, as well as his investigati ...

and

Reuben Hersh Reuben Hersh (December 9, 1927 – January 3, 2020) was an American mathematician and academic, best known for his writings on the nature, practice, and social impact of mathematics. Although he was generally known as Reuben Hersh, late in life h ...

, ''Matter, Space, and Motion: Theories in Antiquity and Their Sequel'' (1988) by

Richard Sorabji Sir Richard Rustom Kharsedji Sorabji, (born 8 November 1934) is a British historian of ancient Western philosophy, and Professor of Philosophy Emeritus at King's College London. He has written his 'Intellectual Autobiography' in his ''Festschrift' ...

, ''Paradoxes of Free Will'' (2002) by

Gunther Stent Gunther S. Stent (28 March 1924 – 12 June 2008) was Graduate Professor of Molecular Biology at the University of California, Berkeley. One of the early bacteriophage biologists, he was known also for his studies on the metabolism of bacter ...

, and ''Uncentering the Earth: Copernicus and On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres'' (2006) by

William T. Vollmann William Tanner Vollmann (born July 28, 1959) is an American novelist, journalist, war correspondent, short story writer, and essayist. He won the 2005 National Book Award for Fiction with the novel ''Europe Central''.

. Some books devoted to mysticism which have also used the engraving include ''Love and Law'' (2001) by

Ernest Holmes Ernest Shurtleff Holmes (January 21, 1887 – April 7, 1960) was an American New Thought writer, teacher, and leader. He was the founder of a spiritual movement known as Religious Science, part of the greater New Thought movement, whose spir ...

and ''Gnosticism: New Light on the Ancient Tradition of Inner Knowing'' (2002) by Stephan A. Hoeller. The image was reproduced on the title page of the score of

Brian Ferneyhough Brian John Peter Ferneyhough (; born 16 January 1943) is an English composer. Ferneyhough is typically considered the central figure of the New Complexity movement. Ferneyhough has taught composition at the Hochschule für Musik Freiburg and ...

's "Transit: Six Solo Voices and Chamber Orchestra", published by Edition Peters in 1975. British artist David Oxtoby made a drawing inspired by the Flammarion engraving (''Spiritual Pilgrim''), showing the face of

David Bowie David Robert Jones (8 January 194710 January 2016), known professionally as David Bowie ( ), was an English singer-songwriter and actor. A leading figure in the music industry, he is regarded as one of the most influential musicians of the ...

near drawing's right margin where the Sun should be. David Oxtoby's drawing doesn't show the crawling man at left. An interpretation of the image was used for the animated sequence about the cosmological vision of

Giordano Bruno Giordano Bruno (; ; la, Iordanus Brunus Nolanus; born Filippo Bruno, January or February 1548 – 17 February 1600) was an Italian philosopher, mathematician, poet, cosmological theorist, and Hermetic occultist. He is known for his cosmologic ...

in the March 9, 2014 premiere of the TV series '' Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey'', hosted by the astrophysicist

Neil deGrasse Tyson Neil deGrasse Tyson ( or ; born October 5, 1958) is an American astrophysicist, author, and science communicator. Tyson studied at Harvard University, the University of Texas at Austin, and Columbia University. From 1991 to 1994, he was a po ...

. More recently in May 2021, an interpretation of the image has featured on a limited edition book release by Yusuf/Cat Stevens. In the German-language video series "Von Aristoteles zur Stringtheorie", ("From Aristotle to String Theory"), which is hosted on YouTube and produced by Urknall, Weltall, und das Leben, and features Professor Joseph Gaßner as lecturer, a colored Flammarion engraving was selected as a logo, but the man is peering at a background filled with the important equations of physics. Some commentators have claimed that Flammarion produced the image to propagandize the myth that medieval Europeans widely believed the Earth to be flat.See, e.g.
here
an
here
In his book, however, Flammarion never discusses the history of beliefs about the shape of the Earth. His text suggests that the image is simply a fanciful illustration of the false view of the sky as an opaque barrier.

References

External links

Georg Peez: "Zum Beispiel; Anonymer und undatierter Holzschnitt"
. {{DEFAULTSORT:Flammarion Woodcut 1880s works 19th-century prints Works of unknown authorship Sun in art Moon in art