I am the happy owner of several copper gravures with constellations from 1799. These maps are from the atlas of Christian Friedrich Goldbach (1763-1811) "Neuester Himmels-Atlas".

There are three aspects that make these maps interesting:
1. The maps show white stars on a black background.
2. The method of printing, the copper plates were printed in relief (with the ink on the surface), the other atlases are printed in intaglio
(with the ink down in the engraved lines and the surface wiped clean).
3. The atlas not only has the maps shown with the constellations drawn on it, but also without.

I have added to the original plates (left side) also an inverted image (right side), in order to make the images easier to study.
This immediately shows how difficult this printing technique must have been, because the outlines are not so well defined and crisp compared to the atlases of Fortin, Ciera/Villas-Boas and Bode.

I RECOMMEND VIEWING THE MAPS IN THEIR ORIGINAL SIZE!