Costumes anciens et modernes by Cesare Vecellio - 1859-1860: Habiti antichi et moderni di tutto il mundo

Very good copy of the fourth and best edition of this famous Renaissance collection of world costumes.

With 513 costume plates printed on fine vellum paper, with each plate facing a page of descriptive text in Italian and French.

This new edition has all the original costume plates corrected by Gerard Seguin and engraved on wood by Etienne Huyot. The decorative frames to both costume and text pages were engraved by H. Catenacci and Fellmann.

A panorama of world costume from European nobility and peasants, Venetian senators, prostitutes, Turkish pirates and dervishes, ancient Roman soldiers, fanciful Japanese and Nestorian costumes, Native Americans from Virginia and Peru taken from travel books, etc.

Cesare Vecellio (c.1521-1601) was an Italian artist, cousin and assistant to Titian, active in Venice and Augsburg. In 1590, he published his collection of costumes of all nations with woodcuts copied from Christoph Krieger. Despite many fanciful and imaginary costumes, it became an iconic source in the history of costume and fashions.

In half red shagreen leather, four raised bands, gilt titles and tooling, marbled boards with bumping to corners, marble endpapers, interior clean and bright with good impressions of the woodblocks, slight offsetting and foxing to some plates and text.