Early modern person and his/her costume in the 16–18th century engravings

Abstract

A great number of engraved images of representatives of various countries and peoples, various social strata and occupations were created during the 16–18th centuries. The main focus of artists' attention was on the costume as the most important marker of the person's ethnic and social belonging. The article considers the evolution of the genre of “costume” albums from the first manuscript “Book of Clothes” by M. Schwartz and some 16th century editions to the four volume “Collection of dresses of different nations” where almost all the clothes images, accumulated to the middle of the 18th century, were summarized. Those were types from 16th century books, V. Hollar's engravings, illustrations from descriptions of different countries, characters from geographical atlases, drawings of contemporaries.