Le Monde en Estampes by Elisabeth Muller (Léonie Bédelet) - [1858]: Types et Costumes des Principaux Peuples de l'Univers

Good copy of a suite of 24 finely hand-coloured lithographs depicting the people of the world

Complete with all 24 illustrations by Felix Fossey and Auguste Leloir, richly hand-coloured figures on sepia-tinted backgrounds (it was also issued in sepia only)

The plates depict people from five continents, with 11 from Europe, three of Asia, three of Africa, three of America and three of Oceania. Frontispiece shows the dispersion of people from the Tower of Babel. The plates show traditional inhabitants of the regions: flamenco dancers in Spain, kilted highlanders in Britain, Berbers and Arabs in Algeria, Sami people in Norway, etc. The backgrounds are atmospheric locations such as street markets, a Chinese palace courtyard with pagoda, Indian temples, Dutch windmills, Senatskaia Square in St. Petersburg, Russia, etc.

Many of the scenes include fascinating vignettes. A lazaroni (leper) prostrating himself on the ground in Italy, aborigines in Australia examining flotsam from a European shipwreck, a man from the extinct Charrua people of Brazil, Circassian soldiers before the genocide, a Signare woman from the slave-trading Ile de Goree (Senegal), Native American men selling skins to a European trapper, a snake charmer in an Egyptian market, a Bohemian (Romany) woman in Germany, etc.

Léonie Bédelet, 1814-1892, was a prolific author, editor, printer, adapter, and translator of juvenile, classic, history and illustrated works. Writing under the pseudonyms Elisabeth Muller and Leonie Carlier, she published editions of Buffon, Don Quixote, La Fontaine's Fables, the Bible and classical mythology aimed at children and young adults from 1846 until about 1868.

Felix Fossey, 1826-1899, was a French painter, son of the sculptor Andre Julien Fossey. He studied at the Ecole des beaux-arts de Paris from 1844, and won a prix de Rome in 1852. Later taught drawing at schools in Saint-Cyr and Versailles.

Auguste Leloir, 1809-1892, was French painter of history paintings and portraits. Husband of water-colourist Heloise Colin, and father of artist Alexandre-Louis Leloir and illustrator Maurice Leloir. Awarded a prix de Rome in 1835, he exhibited at the Paris Salon from 1835 to 1841.

Jean-Adolphe Bocquin, 1826-1880, was a French printmaker and lithographer.

Brown cloth covers stained and spotted, darkened and chipped at spine, front board only holding on by the endpapers, gilt title stamped on front cover, a.e.g., ticket of Genkido bookseller on front endpaper and Librairie de la Fontaine on rear endpaper, Japanese library stamps to title page only, scattered spotting to text pages throughout, all plates with tissue guards, sepia lithographs with vivid hand-colouring, a few spots outside the plate marks. Binding in need of some TLC.