German engraver, part of a family of engravers, son of Bartholomäus Kilian I (1548-1588). He was apprenticed to his stepfather Dominicus Custos (c. 1550-1612), an engraver from Antwerp. His earliest independent print shows the influence of the Netherlands, which was to be lasting: it is a large view of the Augustus Fountain in Augsburg (1599) after a drawing by Frans Aspruck (born c. 1575), exhibiting the type of display work brought by Italian-trained Dutch artists to Augsburg. In 1601 Kilian himself travelled to Italy. He went from town to town, mainly making reproductive engravings. In Venice (1602-03) he copied works by Titian, Paolo Veronese, Jacopo Tintoretto and Palma Vecchio; some of these prints are the only records of now untraced paintings. From this time he developed a painterly manner, achieving fine gradations of light and shade with richly varied use of the burin. //