The World in Dress: Costume Books across Italy, Europe, and the East

Costume books and albums shaped a new visual culture in the early modern period, displaying the diversity of people from different lands on various media. They blurred the lines between art and science, with artists and geographers in the Ottoman Empire and Far East also contributing to this textual and visual production. This Element contributes to the expanding field of early modern cultural studies in a global perspective.

Format: Paperback / softback
Length: 75 pages
Publication date: 15 September 2022
Publisher: Cambridge University Press

In the early modern period, costume books and albums played a significant role in shaping a new visual culture that showcased the diversity of the people of the known world across various media, including maps, atlases, screens, and scrolls. At the intersection of early anthropology, geography, and travel literature, this textual and visual production blurred the boundaries between art and science. Costume books and albums were not exclusively European creations; artists and geographers in the Ottoman Empire and the Far East also depicted the dress of men and women from their own and distant lands, blending the Renaissance Western tradition with their own cultural influences. Recognizing the circulation of knowledge and people through migration, travel, missionary, and diplomatic encounters, this Element contributes to the growing field of early modern cultural studies with a global perspective.

Weight: 178g
Dimension: 152 x 227 x 11 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9781108823302