Hartmann Schedel of Nuremberg was one of the first cartographers to make use of the printing press.

Many of the cities featured in his "Schedelsche Welt Chronik ", or world chronicle are maps of cities and countries illustrated for the first time ever.

The World Chronicle was published in Nuremberg in 1493. With the recent establishment of the printing press by Johann Gutenberg it rapidly became feasible to print books and maps for a larger customer basis, whereas earlier books had been extremely rare, due to them having to be handwritten.