Gaspard van der Heyden

Gaspard van der Heyden (also known as Gaspar à Myrica ) (c. 1496 – c. 1549) was a goldsmith, engraver, master printer and builder of precision astronomical instruments including terrestrial and celestial globes from Leuven, Belgium. He was well known among the humanists in Leuven as well as among scientists and mathematicians.

Career Gaspard van der Heyden was a goldsmith in Leuven whose work ranged from civic metalwork to the construction of early scientific instruments. He is recorded as an "aurifaber" (goldsmith) in demographic records from 1524 and his name appears several times in the civic records of Leuven.

In 1526 or 1527, he produced a terrestrial and a celestial globe with the Franciscan friar and cartographer Franciscus Monachus of Mechelen. In that letter, Monachus describes how the globe represented the world. thumb

He built another terrestrial globe with the assistance of Gemma Frisius in 1529, but they planned a new globe by 1535 to better represent new geographical discoveries. The new globe was completed in 1536 with Gerardus Mercator who apprenticed under van der Heyden. A celestial globe was produced by Frisius, Mercator and van der Heyden in 1537. Copies of the newer globes were produced until the 1570s. A legend engraved on the celestial globe reads "Made by Gemma Frisius, doctor and mathematician, Gaspar à Myrica [Van der Heyden], and Gerardus Mercator of Rupelmonde in the year of the virgin birth 1537."

On 4 July 1549, he received compensation for a five-day stay in Antwerp, where he bought a cup from the goldsmith Matthieu van Campen. This gilded silver cup was then decorated with the coat of arms of the town, inscribed with the inscription "insignia oppidi Lovaniensis", and presented to Philip II of Spain on 5 July 1549 during his visit to Leuven.