Description

Original hand-coloured engraved plate. Edges gilt. Large 4to. (37 x 27 cm). With its separate sheet of descriptive bilingual text in English and French. An attractive, richly colored and detailed engraved image. Very good, bright. An original plate from Dalvimart's famous and extremely rare work 'The costume of Turkey', first edition in 1802. Little is known about Octavien Dalvimart, besides the facts that he worked in Britain as painter and engraver, and that he was living in Paris in 1803. According to the prologue to this edition, he travelled during four years (starting in 1796), always drew from nature, and was in Athens in 1797. This elegant work was first published in 1802, and again in 1818 and 1820. It includes 60 drawings of human types from the Ottoman Empire. (Abbey Travel 370; Colas 782; Lipperheide 1422). The explanatory texts, in English and French, are based on extracts from works by Baron de Tott, J. Dallaway, G.A. Olivier, M. Montague, J. Pitton de Tournefort, ?ouradgea d'Ohsson and others. Dalvimart's drawings have been used in similar albums and illustrated other travel accounts. Human types are precisely drawn and handsomely depicted in very real colors. "This is the dress of a Turk, whenever he ventures abroad on foot: but this, among the higher ranks, is never done in the streets of Constantinople. The clokes are generally ornamented with rich and valuable furs, and the châlls [sic. shals] or shawls, are also very richly worked. The male dress of the Turks is regulated by sumptuary laws, and is distinctive of the different classes, but the females are permitted to wear any sort of ornament they choose. The TUrks of any considerable rank in life consider it as a degradation to be seen walking; and they constantly go about the city on horseback, accompanied by a numerous train of servants on foot. Some very pompous and rich individuals have been known to have above an hundred in their train. These are always as richly dressed, and as numerous as possible at any of their feasts, particularly that of the Beyram (sic. Bayram)". = "Tel est l'habillement d'un Turc toutes les fois qu'il lui rrive de sortir a pied. Mais c'est ce que les gens de distinction ne font jamais dans les rues de Constantinople. Les mantaux sont generalement ornes de fourrures de tres grand prix, et les châles aussi sont tres richement brodees." etc.