Adolf Stieler

Stielers Handatlas was a compact world atlas conceived by Adolf Stieler and published by Justus Perthes in Gotha. Its first edition appeared in parts during the early nineteenth century and established a series that continued long after Stieler's death.

Successive editors revised its boundaries, place names, and geographic information as the world changed. The Justus Perthes publishing house maintained the atlas through multiple editions into the twentieth century.

Stieler emphasized geographic precision, legible lettering, and dense factual content rather than elaborate ornament. That practical approach made the Handatlas useful to educated households, schools, and scholars.

No, the atlas became a long-running collaborative publication involving engravers, editors, and later cartographers. Stieler supplied the original concept, but later editions were updated by figures associated with the Gotha school of cartography.