ABRAHAM, a celebrated geographer, born at Antwerp in the year 1527. He was well skilled in languages and the mathematics, and acquired such reputation by his knowledge in geography, that he was surnamed the Ptolemy of his time. Justus Lipsius, and most of the great men of the sixteenth century, were the friends of Ortelius. He resided at Oxford in the reign of Edward VI. and came a second time into England in 1577. His Theatrum Orbis was the most complete work of the kind, which had yet been published, and gained him a reputation equal to the immense labour bestowed in compiling it. He also wrote several other geographical works, the principal of which are his Thesaurus, and his Synonyma Geographica. The world is likewise indebted to him for the Britannia, which he persuaded Camden to undertake. He died at Antwerp in the year 1598.