Secret Museum of Mankind [Illustrated] [Paperback]

David Stiffler (Foreword)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 6, 1999

6X9In, 576Pp, 1000+ Black & White Photos Travel Four Continents and The Islands of The Seas Through The Pages of This Fascinating Book, Originally Published Nearly A Century Ago. Illustrated With Over A Thousand Black-And-White Photos, The Secret Museum of Mankind Offers A Glimpse Into The Lives of Hundreds of Cultures of Mankind In Nativve Dress, At Work and At Leisure. From Masked Warrior Tribes of New Guinea and Decoratively Intricate Scars of Congo Natives To Heavily Veiled Women of Islan and Incredible Postures of Hindu Ascetics, You Will Be Captivated By The Range of Dress, Body Decor, Traditions, Rituals, and Religions Displayed Within Its Pages.

Editorial Reviews

From the Back Cover

Open up The Secret Museum of Mankind and discover a lost world--the fading faces of the indigenous humanity that once covered the globe. Within these pages, the curious armchair adventurer will be taken on a visual tour of the native cultures of America, Africa, Asia, Europe, and the islands of the seas as they existed upon the book's first publication nearly a century ago. Over a thousand black-and-white photographs with captions that reflect the unabashed curiosity and marked sensationalism of the early-twentieth-century adventurer transport the reader to another era. Here revealed are the astonishing variety of rituals, religions, customs, physical decorations, and dress of the world's native cultures. One cannot help but be spellbound by the elaborate costuming, the intricate and painstaking bodily manipulations, the fascinating practices of he cultures whose native expressions and lifestyles have unfortunately suffered at the destructive advancing hands of the twentieth century.

About the Author

Introduction

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Product Details

• Paperback: 576 pages
• Publisher: Gibbs Smith, Publisher (April 6, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0879059125
• ISBN-13: 978-0879059125
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6.1 x 1.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,052,525 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Ethnography as an Unknown, June 12, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Secret Museum of Mankind (Paperback)

I doubt that you, the reader, will often encounter a review of a book that the reviewer hasn't read (or maybe that's more common than we know). I will eventually buy and read this particular book, if only to see if it's as enthralling as is the original edition from decades ago. I may or may not have the original edition, nobody really knows. The origins of the book seem to be shrouded in mystery. Hopefully, Mr. Stiffler provides some expository information in his introduction. My copy lists no author, date of publication or other information; only the cryptic "New York, Manhattan House."

This is a book that must be read (rather perused) to be believed. One could certainly think the author (?) a racist and a unicultural bigot, if it were not for the fact that there seems to be no race, ethnic group, or gender about which he (?) cannot make a disparaging or condescending remark. All of that aside, however, this is a book (actually the original is "Five Volumes in One") with some of the most remakable photographs one will ever encounter. If, indeed, one person is responsible for all the photographs and did visit all the lands, peoples, and cultures featured, this is one of the most astonishing journals of travel that can be encountered. There are photographs the like of which you will not have seen anywhere else. It is the "Geographic" taken to degrees of documentation they could have achieved only by a conscious decision to toss any pretense of science out the window and replace it with sensationalistic photographs that even the pulps of the day wouldn't have touched. But, oh those photographs!

Other than the preceeding words, I'll write no more other than to say, "You must have this book for your personal library," and "I'll soon add this particular edition to mine."

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Testement and Epitaph to Human Cultural Diversity, September 12, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Secret Museum of Mankind (Paperback)

Awesome book. It is made up entirely of captioned photos taken in the, apparently, the 1920's. It subject is indigineous cultures around the world. It's an amazing testement to the diversity of human cultures while also being an epitaph for many of these cultures no longer exist or have been absorbed into Westernized one we live in today. The captions are enthnocentric but the photos boggle the mind.

4.0 out of 5 stars Cultural surprise!, October 22, 2008

By 

Damian Yee "KingstonKool" (Paris, France) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Secret Museum of Mankind (Paperback)

Basically this book is made up of captioned photographs taken around the beginning of the 1900's. My hardcover copy, printed on newspaper like paper, thus justifying the same 'old newspaper' quality pictures!(The paper is also a little yellow!) And, there is no table of contents, nor page numbers!
Overall, it richly catologues diverse cultures and has an interesting occidental point of view on these foreign traditions!! Details are practically non existent due to the poor quality of the reproductions but it makes up for that in the quantity of photos!
Extremely interesting to look through and can be used to find out about, in a sort of quick impression, of different cultures, and their names.