You decide, we display!

Object 2: Atlas of the Moral World
Book with copper engravings, 1802 

Franz Johann Joseph von Reilly (1766-1820) was a bookseller and publisher who was interested in cartography as well as in science and literature. Among other things, he designed, produced and published an atlas with ten allegorical maps in which he put social concepts ("Empire of Honour") or mental states ("City of Self-Love") on paper in geographical form. In this way, many aspects of human life are taken into account as names of places or countries: His "Realm of Speculation" is criss-crossed by dense forests and ironically lies between the "Sea of Despair" and the "Bottomless Sea". Such imaginary maps have a centuries-old tradition and often served as a tongue-in-cheek critique of human behaviour or social conditions.