This illustrated gazetteer, running into fourteen volumes, presents a detailed description of the peoples of all nations in their habits as they live. Tracing their racial origins it discusses at length their history, their manners and customs. Enriched with 111 pages of coloured photographs and 12 pages of coloured maps, it arranges the nations of world in alphabetical order.
Sir John Alexander Hammerton (1871-1949) was an English statesman and author, best-known for his editorship of popular encyclopaedias published in the first half of the 20th century, such as the 10-volume New Book of Knowledge. From 1914 to 1919, Hammerton was joint editor with HW Wilson of the periodical The Great War: The Standard History of the All-Europe Conflict, published by the Amalgamated Press. It was lavishly illustrated with photographs and with realistic drawings which were sometimes hardly distinguishable from photographs. He was also a contemporary and friend of Arthur Mee, about whom he wrote a biography.
