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Description
WAHLEN (Auguste).
Customs, traditions and dress of all the peoples of the world, based on authentic documents and the most recent travels.
Brussels: La Librairie Historique-artistique, 1843–1844. — 4 volumes in-8, 267 × 176: frontispiece, (2 ff.), 82 plates (Asia); (2 ff.), 368 pp., 36 plates (Oceania); (2 ff.), 365 pp., (1 f.), 43 plates (Africa – the Americas); (2 ff.), 361 pp., (1 f.), 48 plates (out of 49) (Europe). Black half-chagrin with corner pieces, thick gilded lines, plain decorated spine, gilt head, untrimmed (contemporary binding).
Colas, 3041.
First edition published by Auguste Wahlen (1785–1850), a pseudonym for Jean-François Loumyer, illustrated with 4 title vignettes and 210 (out of 211) plates of costumes, all wood-engraved, coloured and gummed.
The work offers a study of the peoples of the world known at the time. The author, following the example of zoologists such as Cuvier and Lesson, distinguishes three primitive human races: the white or Caucasian race, the yellow or Mongolian race, and the black or African race. His aim is to study their subdivisions as well as their moral and intellectual differences.
Black people are described in the introduction in the following terms:
‘The typical representative of the Black race has black or blackish skin, which exudes an oily and foul-smelling sweat; an elongated head that tapers at the top; a low forehead; protruding jaws; oblique teeth longer than those of the preceding races; a broad, flat nose, thick lips, a very large mouth, prominent cheeks, hair that is generally short and woolly, and a short, very sparse beard; the facial angle is barely 75 degrees. It is found scattered across a few islands in Oceania and in the central and southern parts of Africa. A great many of its people, having been enslaved, went to settle in the white colonies in the Americas: there they have multiplied, and their numbers now exceed those of their masters.’
A copy in very fine period colouring. Each volume is complete, with the exception of the last, from which one plate is missing (Colas mentions 49).
Normal wear and tear. Foxing.
Provenance:
Bookplate ‘Bibliotheca Vallis Scholarium’. – Bourlon de Rouvre, with bookplate.
See original version (French)
Auto-translation. Refer to original language for legal validity.
About the sale
Claude Mozis Library – Black Africa and the African diaspora
Auction location
Auction time
10/21/2026 at 2:00 PM
Pictures credits: Contact the Auction House
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