The Worldwide History of Dress covers every notable geographical region, historical period and style of costume worldwide – from Upper Paleolithic plant-fibre skirts, Ancient Egyptian linen shifts and Roman togas, through Mongolian shamanic robes, Japanese kimonos and Indian saris, to nineteenth-century Tyrolean dirndls, African ceremonial attire and Middle Eastern burqas.

All aspects of dress and accessories are discussed: men’s and women’s clothing, footwear, headgear, jewelry, armour, decoration, and face and body modification, using an astonishing variety of sources including mosaics, vintage photographs and colour plates of museum-quality displays.

Diagrams explain how garments are worn, line drawings illustrate traditional motifs and designs, and there are over fifty specially commissioned maps.

While tracing influences from culture to culture, this tour-de-force includes descriptions of each region’s population, geography and climate, allowing the reader to understand the development of an area’s clothing customs.

Complete with an extensive reference section

Patricia Rieff Anawalt is the founding Director of the Center for the Study of Regional Dress at the Fowler Museum at UCLA, Los Angeles. Her previous publications include the prize-winning, four-volume Codex Mendoza, as well as dozens of articles. She is a Fellow of the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of London, and also served on the initial President’s Cultural Property Advisory Committee.