Native and Chief of Vannu, Vanikoro, Antique Wahlen Costume Print, 1843-1844

An original antique wood engraving of a native and a chief of Vannu on Vanikoro, an ethnographic costume print from Auguste Wahlen's Moeurs, usages et costumes de tous les peuples du monde, published in Brussels between 1843 and 1844. The plate is lettered "Naturel et chef de Vannu (Vanikoro)", Vannu being a district or settlement of the island as French visitors recorded the name. Vanikoro, in the Santa Cruz group of what is now the Solomon Islands, was where the expedition of La Perouse was lost in 1788, and the French searches that followed, including the voyages of Dumont d'Urville in the 1820s and 1830s, produced most of the drawings of its people that reached Europe. Several plates in this part of the series are believed to derive from that material. The caption's pairing of a commoner with a chief reflects the period's interest in reading rank from dress.

Moeurs, usages et costumes de tous les peuples du monde was published in Brussels by Auguste Wahlen at the Librairie Historique-Artistique between 1843 and 1844. The four volumes set out to describe the dress, customs, occupations and social divisions of the peoples of Europe, Asia, Africa, the Americas and Oceania, drawing on travel narratives, earlier costume books and other sources then treated as authoritative, and they carried approximately one hundred and ninety to two hundred plates, the count varying between copies and editions.

Wahlen was the publisher and compiler rather than the artist; where a name such as Duverger, Pannemaker, Mercier, Lisbet, Markaert or Vermorcken appears on a sheet it belongs to the illustrator or the engraver, and no artist is attributed here without one.

The plates are wood engravings on paper. The images should be read as a nineteenth century European interpretation of the cultures they show rather than as a documentary record, which is a large part of what makes the series interesting to historians of the period. The sheet is uncoloured, as issued, and the wood engraving prints with the crisp line and even tone that suits a simple mount and a plain frame. Plates from this series group well, and a set of four or six drawn from the Oceania section hangs better together than a single sheet on its own.

The sheet is in good condition for its age, with light toning, a small crease at the upper right edge and a few minor spots; the image is otherwise clean and strong.

This is an original antique print, not a modern reproduction. This item is sold unframed. Any framed or interior images are shown for presentation and inspiration only, unless the listing explicitly states that the item is sold framed.