Augustus Heinrich Petermann (18 April 182225 September 1878) was a German cartographer.

Early years

Petermann was born in Bleicherode, Germany. When he was 14 years old, he started grammar school in the nearby town of Nordhausen. Despite family pressures to become a clergyman, he pursued his passion for cartography instead.

Heinrich Berghaus, with the support of Alexander von Humboldt, started the 'Geographische Kunstschule' (Geographical School of Art) in 1839 in Potsdam, close to Berlin, following the example of the school for engravers at the Archives Militaires Generales in Paris (founded in 1811). During its existence, Berghaus's academy offered only three courses, and only a few students attended: 1839–1844: August Petermann, Heinrich 'Henry' Lange (1821–1893), and Otto Göcke, who died one year later of tuberculosis. 1844–1847: Amandus Sturmhöfel (1823–?) and Theodor Schilling. 1845–1850: Hermann Berghaus (1828–1890), his nephew.

Petermann's father, August Rudolf Petermann, who was a registrar at Bleicherode, could not pay for the further education of his son. When he read the advertisement for Berghaus' school he sent his son's maps and other work for evaluation. One of the maps, drawn when he was 16, shows South America, and was later published in the journal which was to carry his name.Petermann’s Geographische Mittheilungen 106(1962), table 123 Berghaus recognized the quality of Petermann's work, and therewith his potential and soon took him in as a foster-son. As Berghaus already had a large family to feed, however, he requested an annual subsidy of 60 thaler from the king to support Petermann, which was granted. During the 3rd course, Berghaus treated his nephew Hermann Berghaus the same way. Only Lange paid for the courses, the rest followed them at Berghaus's own expense.

Petermann started his education in Potsdam on 7 August 1839. The education with Berghaus was scientifically cartographic, consisting of mathematical geography (map projections and grids), physical geography (meteorology, hydrology and geology) and political geography (knowledge of borders and administrative divisions of European states especially). Physical training was aimed at surveying, drafting and engraving. Berghaus's pupils learned only the rudiments of surveying, even less than he himself had learned: their work in this area can be seen in the plan of Potsdam (Neüester Plan von der Königlichen Residenzstadt Potsdam / nach trigonometrischen Vermessungen, so wie geo- und hydrometrischen Aufnahmen ausgearbeitet in der Geographischen Kunstschule zu Potsdam unter der Leitung ihres Direktors, des Professors Dr. Heinrich Berghaus. 1845). They were not topographers and only used topography as published in the large-scale maps of that era as a general basis for their later, more generalized works. They were taught more to draft and engrave medium-scale geographic maps of states, continents etc., or their parts (e.g. the map of upper and middle-Italy in 1847 for Stielers Handatlas, which was based on Attilio Zuccagni-Orlandini's 1844 topographic map in nearly 100 sheets), small-scale generalised school maps, and especially applied geography and cartography as shown in their collaboration on the Physikalischer Atlas and the maritime atlas. During their study lithography, though not cutting as fine a portrayal as copper engraving, was on the rise because it was much cheaper. Though some experiments were made by Berghaus, e.g. for geological maps, by mixing copper engraving for the line- and other features and lithography for coloured polygons, there was no technology that could replace the exquisite expression copper engravings could reach. So the students mainly learned this art. Only at the end of his life did Petermann became more enthusiastic about lithography, which had advanced by then. Up to and including the 10th edition of the Stieler Handatlas (1920–1925) the Perthes Institute, where he worked from 1854 onwards, used copperplate engravings as the basis for its maps. Some 460 copperplates of this edition are currently preserved in the Perthes collections in Gotha.

Berghaus had been riding numerous hobbyhorses (terrain representation, isolines, scale indicators, map projections, etc.) without much success, but now he could finally put them to work with his pupils. He very successfully disseminated many of his ideas and concepts. Moreover, his students somehow learned better than he to limit their endeavors in order to bring more of them to full fruition. Though the school itself had but few students, its residency in Potsdam, connected by rail to Berlin, and the fame of Berghaus attracted many geographers (e.g. Alexander von Humboldt, Carl Ritter and Zeune), cartographers and explorers. Petermann spoke highly of his encounters with von Humboldt and drew several maps for his Atlas von Asien, on which the rendering of the Asiatic mountain chains was of a quality corresponding to the then-current view of the geographic sciences. Because of all these contacts, the students were confronted with many opinions and views on the state of science and the world that would not normally have been part of their curriculum. Besides, we may take Poggendorff seriously when he sees Petermann as 'private secretary and librarian of H.K.W. Berghaus' in the years 1839–45, so we can assume that Petermann was at least quite up to date on many affairs to do with geography and cartography, for Berghaus had large collections of maps, books and notes to draw on.From his early years he had excerpted 'everything new, which becomes available in the geographical sciences', and these excerpts were sorted and well organised in his Kollectaneen. This habit led to his 'geographischen Hefte' (geographic notebooks) ... (Engelmann, Gerhard. 1960. August Petermann als Kartographenlehrling bei Heinrich Berghaus in Potsdam. In: Petermanns Geographische Mitteilungen 106, p. 178). They also contained hundreds of pages of lectures by Von Humboldt, Ritter, Hoffman, Pöppig, Erdman, etc. which he later plagiarised in some of his books. He used this word himself in his schoolbook Ersten Elementen der Erdbeschreibung: Plagiatoren sind die Gladiatoren auf den Tooneel-Brettern der Geographentruppe (Plagiarists are the gladiators on the stage floor of the geographers' company') (Engelmann, Gerhard. 1977. Heinrich Berghaus, der Kartograph von Potsdam, p. 167). He alluded here to the way Ortelius had conceived the Theatre oft Tooneel des Aerdtbodems in 1571, though to be fair to Ortelius one should note he cited his sources in his Catalogus auctorum tabularum geographicarum.

During and after their training, students were obliged to take part in most of the school's enterprises. In the years 1839–1848, the school produced maps for Stieler's school atlas, and Berghaus's Physikalischer Atlas,Geographische verbreitung der menschen-rassen. ubersicht der nahrungsweise und der volksdichtigkeit in den ackerbaulandern, Auch manches zur physik des menschen. 7te abtheilung: Anthropographie no 1. gezeichnet u. gestochen in der geogr. Kunstschule zu Potsdam. Gotha, J. Perthes, 1848. school atlases, the Atlas von Asien, the Prussian atlas, and the maritime atlas.

British experience

Scotland August Petermann gained commercial insight during his years in the cartography business in Edinburgh and London from 1845 to 1854. Normally he would have been obliged to work in Berghaus' school until 1849, as it was laid down in the contracts the students had to sign. These stated that the students had to work for five years after they finished their studies to pay for their tuition.

In 1842, Alexander Keith Johnston (1804–1871) visited Gotha to discuss several projects with Perthes. These negotiations first resulted in the publication of the National Atlas of General Geography, which contained 4 maps by Berghaus. Though Berghaus deemed the commercial and scientific climate in England not ready for scientific maps Johnston persisted in wanting to publish a translation of the Physikalischer Atlas, on which he requested aid from Berghaus. With a letter of recommendation by von Humboldt in October 1844, Heinrich 'Henry' Lange joined Johnston in Edinburgh for this purpose. Petermann stayed behind in Gotha and became a teacher in the 2nd course of Berghaus' school. In April 1845, he followed Lange, who received him in his house in Edinburgh and acquainted him with the friends he had made. Together they went on a tour through the Grampians, applying what they had learned by using barometers for height measurements and taking geological and botanical samples. Meanwhile, they also worked on Johnston's Physical atlas (Physical geography, illustrating in a series of original designs, the elementary facts of geology, hydrology, meteorology and natural history etc.) and several other cartographic publications.

During his time in Edinburgh, he may have come into contact with the publisher G.H. Swanston, for whom he constructed several maps for The Royal Illustrated Atlas, Of Modern Geography, 1st edition published in 27 parts 1854–62. and republished probably in 1872. He also may have met John Bartholomew Jr. (1831–1893) in Edinburgh, who created many maps in the same atlas. John Bartholomew became Petermann's student in Gotha in 1855 until he was recalled to his father's firm in 1856. The German school of cartography was pre-eminent, and four generations of Bartholomews widened their knowledge by studying with the German masters. John George's son Ian Bartholomew studied in Leipzig (1907–08) with Oswald Winkel. His grandson John Christopher carried on the tradition, studying with Eduard Imhof, the great Swiss cartographer, in Berne and Zurich in 1960, and his son John Eric followed in 1977 with Imhof's pupil, Ernst Spiess. "Bartholomew is best known for the development of colour contouring (or hypsometric tints), the system of representing altitudes on a graduated colour scale, with areas of high altitude in shades of brown and areas of low altitude in shades of green. He first showcased his colour contouring system at the Paris Exhibition of 1878; although it initially met with skepticism, it went on to become standard cartographical practice". However, he might have picked up this idea during his time in Gotha as the colour scheme was first introduced by Emil von Sydow (1812–1873) in 1838 when he developed a color methodology for landscape features using hachures, where green was depicted for lowlands and brown used for highlands.Charles P. Daly, president of the American Geographical Society criticized this behavior in his address to the society while speaking of Anaximander's introduction of the gnomen to Greece: "He may have introduced it into Greece, which was enough to have the invention of it attributed to him, for the Greeks were like our English brethen – if any one of their countrymen was connected with the introduction among them of a new art or a discovery, he was frequently declared to be the inventor." Daly, Charles P. (1879). On the early history of cartography, or what we know of maps and map-making, before the time of Mercator. In: Journal of the American Geographical Society, XI, p. 5. The white for the higher reaches might later have been used by Hermann Haack (1872–1966) for his Perthes' wall maps. Several maps were co-constructions of Petermann and Bartholomew.

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