[BOEMUS, Johannes]. ~ [Omnium gentium mores, in French]. Recueil de diverses histoires touchant les situations de toutes regio[n]s et pays contenuz es trois parties du monde, avec les particulieres mœurs, loix, & ceremonies de toutes nations & peuples y habitans. Novelleme[n]t traduict de Latin en Francoys. Paris: Jean Ruelle, 1545.
16mo (108 × 70 mm), ff. [29], 1-291, 310-363 (actually 346, complete despite misnumbering after f. 291), collates a-y8; AY8; AA-CC6. Woodcut initials. Seventeenth century black morocco, gilt, spine with 5 raised bands, elaborately gilt in compartments, red morocco label, red edges. Lightly rubbed. A very good copy.
First published in Latin in 1520, this is considered the first ethnographic compendium of the Early Modern period in Europe, a collection of the manners and customs of all mankind, as it was then known to most Europeans. It considers Africa, Asia and Europe. It first appeared in French in 1540. Its first appearance in English was as William Waterman’s The Fardle of Facions in 1555 and it was printed in forty-seven editions between 1535 and 1620. British Library and Bibliothèque nationale only in WorldCat. Atkinson, La Littérature géographique fraņçaise de la Renaissance: répertoire bibliographique (Paris, 1927), n° 73.