Re: [h-cost] wardrobe size

[Heather Rose Jones]

Wills are often a great place to research this type of question. Unlike a 
trousseau, they tend to reflect possessions at a random point in life (rather 
than a planned-for life transition).  There are a lot of researchers studying 
clothing represented in wills in various times and places, so you might be able 
to find a good selection across time. I sorry not to have specific authors or 
publications to recommend, but that might give you keywords to work from.

Heather

On Oct 8, 2014, at 4:16 PM, Cascio Michael wrote:

> Hello,
>I'm trying to look into the size of the average middle-class woman's 
> wardrobe through the centuries.  Finding advice on the trousseau is easier, 
> at least after the advent of ladies' magazines but I'm most interested in how 
> many dresses a middle class woman would own.  How common was the one dress 
> for every day and one for Sunday with a multitude of aprons?  Do women start 
> having more dresses after the advent of cheap cotton?  Since the list covers 
> a large span of history I'm hoping for answers from many centuries.
>   
>   Cassandra
> 
> 
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Re: [h-cost] Cross dressing documentation - pre 1600

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Oct 6, 2013, at 9:07 PM, e...@huskers.unl.edu wrote:

> There was a book that disappeared from my university library shortly before I 
> got my hands on it: 
> Clothes Make the Man: Female Cross Dressing in Medieval Europe
> http://www.amazon.com/gp/offer-listing/081533771X/ref=dp_olp_used?ie=UTF8&condition=used
> Turns out, used copies are pretty inexpensive, as academic books go.  If it's 
> worthwhile, let me know?

It's an excellent and scholarly book. If you're at all interested in the topic, 
I recommend trying to acquire a copy.

Heather
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Re: [h-cost] Cross dressing documentation - pre 1600

[Heather Rose Jones]

You might find some useful leads in an essay I wrote on female cross-dressing 
in the SCA's period (and in the SCA). While about half the essay is more on the 
"interactional theater" aspects of women cross-dressing in the SCA, the first 
part is an exploration of the motifs and evidence for cross-dressing women in 
history and literature up through the Renaissance. And there's an extensive 
bibliography for further reading.  The article is here: 
http://www.heatherrosejones.com/gender/scacrossdressing.html

Heather

On Oct 6, 2013, at 6:06 PM, Elizabeth Jones wrote:

> Does anyone have SCA period (i.e. medieval to 1600) images or
> documentation referring to cross dressing. I am in the early stages of
> trying to organise a Bob and Kate feast around this time next year
> (for those unfamiliar with the concept the name comes from the episode
> of Blackadder II episode 'bells' in which a young woman named Kate
> disguises herself as a boy called Bob to become Blackadder's
> manservant http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bells_%28Blackadder%29 so
> obviously it's about cross dressing). It has to be in October as it's
> supposed to be a fundraiser for the Ovarian Cancer foundation's
> 'Frocktober' campaign (www.frocktober.org). A year's lead time means I
> hopefully have enough time to get people OK with, or maybe even
> excited about, the idea of cross dressing my two basic strategies are
> telling people that it's for a good cause and showing them that it's
> period (at least in certain circumstances). The 'it's period' part is
> where I need the help of you lovely people to dig out all of those
> obscure sources you have tucked away.
> 
> Thanks for your help in advance,
> Elizabeth
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Re: [h-cost] Chinese peasant costumes... help?

[Heather Rose Jones]

> At 08:18 PM 12/1/2012, you wrote:
>> ...or Tales of a Band Mom.
>> 
>> This year's winter percussion piece is "Terra Cotta Warriors" and first 
>> order of business... peasant costumes for kids in the pit (stationary 
>> instruments like xylophones, chimes, etc.)
>> 
>> What the heck did Chinese peasants wear in 3rd century BC?  Our band 
>> director is proposing simple wrap-style tunics (like short kimonos) and 
>> scrub pants torn below the knee -- both dyed in earthy colors.  
>> Semi-accurate?  Horrible?  Are conical hats appropriate? --although I can 
>> see them getting knocked off.  I'm clueless, and can find neither image nor 
>> description.
>> 
>> Part II will be terracotta soldier costumes to be worn by very active 
>> teenagers with drums, but I need to deal with the peasants first.
>> 
>> Help?
> 

I missed this question before due to zipping through a lot of e-mail.  For 
whatever use it might be, the exhibition "Secrets of the Silk Road" included a 
handful of garments from the period you're interested in from a territory that 
is now part of China (though not in "central China").  It might give you some 
inspiration.  I don't know how easy it would be to get your hands on the 
exhibition catalog, but I took a lot of notes and sketches of the clothing that 
was part of the exhibit and have them posted on my website here:  
http://www.heatherrosejones.com/silkroad/index.html

(My index to the notes is arranged chronologically, which should help you focus 
in on the relevant items.)

To re-emphasize: this items come from a region that is on the very western edge 
of modern China and probably does not represent "core" Chinese culture of the 
time. But in combination with artistic evidence, it may give you a place to 
start.

Heather
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Re: [h-cost] Interesting Underwear find

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Jul 17, 2012, at 11:46 AM, Ann Catelli wrote:

> Some of the garments had some nalbinding or needle-lace fabric insertions on 
> an edge which were certainly more open than the linen to which they're 
> attached.
> 
> And the underpants--for male or female wear, I'm pretty sure they are a 
> unique find and very exciting.

Oh definitely! It would be a shame if the wearer-gender issue gets in the way 
of appreciating what a glorious find this is!

Heather
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Re: [h-cost] Research request: surviving dagged textiles

[Heather Rose Jones]

Thanks, I hadn't been thinking in terms of banners and other furnishings, since 
the original question was in the context of clothing, but I'll pass on all 
references.

Heather

On Apr 25, 2012, at 1:08 AM, Hanna Zickermann wrote:

> I found this one a while ago: 
> http://web.ceu.hu/medstud/manual/SRM/pic/46banner.jpg It´s the first link on 
> this page: http://www.larsdatter.com/banners.htm
> 
> And the dags appear to be lined and not hemmed or left raw, which I find 
> quite sensible on a flag.
> 
> Hanna
> 
> At 07:25 23.04.2012, you wrote:
>> I received a research request via my Surviving Garments database for leads 
>> on surviving textiles or garments that show dagging.  (The question came 
>> from someone who works primarily with art, so he isn't familiar with the 
>> textile sources.)  Since my database doesn't deal in fragments (except in a 
>> few cases) it wasn't much help with the question, and the only examples I 
>> could think of off the top of my head were from the Museum of London 
>> "Textiles and Clothing" book.
>> 
>> I told the original questioner that I'd post around in some relevant groups 
>> to see what else I could turn up to pass on to him.  Does anyone know of 
>> other examples?
>> 
>> Thanks in advance for any help given.
>> 
>> Heather Rose Jones
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[h-cost] Research request: surviving dagged textiles

[Heather Rose Jones]

I received a research request via my Surviving Garments database for leads on 
surviving textiles or garments that show dagging.  (The question came from 
someone who works primarily with art, so he isn't familiar with the textile 
sources.)  Since my database doesn't deal in fragments (except in a few cases) 
it wasn't much help with the question, and the only examples I could think of 
off the top of my head were from the Museum of London "Textiles and Clothing" 
book.

I told the original questioner that I'd post around in some relevant groups to 
see what else I could turn up to pass on to him.  Does anyone know of other 
examples?

Thanks in advance for any help given.

Heather Rose Jones
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Re: [h-cost] costume on book covers, argh

[Heather Rose Jones]

One reason for the frustrating mis-matches between story details and cover in 
the mass market genre fiction industry is that cover art is much more about 
conveying "brand" and sub-genre information than intended to be illustration.  
The idea is to build a (somewhat arbitrary) symbolic vocabulary that answers 
the buyers questions of: What general setting does this story have?  What 
general plot will it have?  In the case of romance, what level of sexual 
content will it have?  And sometimes down to the level of: what specific 
writing style can I expect. 

The cover is intended to stop the eye of a casual bookstore browser and 
communicate to them "This book is going to be similar to those other books you 
liked that had covers with the same 'vocabulary' elements. Consider: the 
average romance buyer isn't looking for a cover that says something like "1480s 
Burgundy, lower nobility" but a cover that says something like "middle ages, no 
time-travel or supernatural elements, passionate courtship but probably little 
explicit sex".

Heather Rose Jones
> 
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Re: [h-cost] Where is everyone hanging out these days?

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Aug 7, 2011, at 8:43 AM, Beteena Paradise wrote:



> Though I have not been vocal for long stretches of time, I have been on this 
> list for about 7 or 8 years. I know many of you have been around for much 
> longer. And I am sure that this was once the best place for everyone to 
> congregate and share and explore the topic together. But as technology has 
> moved 
> forward, email lists are a dying breed.

In my opinion, this is a key factor in what is going on.  _All_ internet 
social/topical-communications contexts are in a constant state of flux.  The 
activity and nature of each context is shaped not only by the structure of the 
interface (e.g., mailing list vs. usenet vs. blogs vs. organized 
blog-communities like LJ) and what types of interactions that interface 
encourages or discourages, enables or makes difficult -- but it's also shaped 
by the nature and trajectory of the group of people participating in it. 

 Is is growing, static, or shrinking?  What is the ratio of old-timers versus 
newcomers?  What is the ratio of substantive posts versus spam and trolling?  
Is the number of participates large enough to make a "critical mass" that keeps 
conversations going?  Is it so large that people give up on keeping up with 
everything and leave or skim?  

How general versus specialized is it?  Does that level of specificity match 
what people are looking for?  How many other contexts are there for the same 
topic, whether in other types of online structures or duplicated in the same 
structure?  (E.g., Usenet was very strict about preventing duplication of topic 
or overspecialization, but mailing lists and places like LJ may have dozens of 
contexts with an identical purpose.)

My own personal observation has been that pretty much every type of online 
discussion context goes through a similar trajectory:

1. The context is brand new and shiny and lots of people flock to it.  New 
people are constantly joining and there is a lot of conversation.

2. The context matures and stabilizes.  Units that fail to reach critical mass 
wither and die, but units that are vibrant and healthy form a sense of social 
unity and cohesion.  This tends to be the point  participates enjoy most and it 
is looked back on later as a Golden Age.

3. The context starts to feel over-large and bloated.  Many people -- often 
those with the most expertise and knowledge -- start to feel it is taking up 
too much of their time and they begin to withdraw.  Hot-button topics begin to 
recycle regularly.  If the security structure of the context allows for it, 
spam and other annoying commercialisms begin to expand in the proportion of 
content they take up.

4. The shiny newness has worn off.  For a variety of reasons (which would be 
another entire essay) a much smaller proportion of the content is new and 
substantive.  People participate less (contributing to the previous) and begin 
looking for a new place to get the same feeling they had in stage 2.

5. The context starts feeling like an abandoned urban center.  Depending on the 
structure, security architecture, and level of moderation, it may simply be 
full of abandoned buildings or it may be the haunt of metaphoric drug dealers 
and muggers.  A few remnants of the original population hang on, hoping that 
things will get back to what they were, but they don't have the energy or the 
critical mass to turn it around.

6. But the inhabitants have gone _somewhere_.  They just may be living a very 
different lifestyle, due to the structural differences in the new context 
they're inhabiting.

I have a much more extended version of this set of observations on my Live 
Journal here: 

http://hrj.livejournal.com/82752.html

and a follow-up here:

http://hrj.livejournal.com/92871.html

How's that for self-referentiality?

But I guess my overall comment is "Nothing is permanent on the internet except 
change.  This cycle of growth and decay has happened to absolutely every type 
of internet forum and is as natural a consequence of the nature of the medium 
as the forum's original growth and vibrancy was."

Heather
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Re: [h-cost] Academic Dress

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Jul 23, 2011, at 6:36 PM, "Susan B. Farmer"  wrote:

> 
> Second -- what I'm looking for is what was Medieval/Renaissance Dress. Our 
> dean keeps saying that Academic Dress (tm) is unchanged since the 14th 
> Century -- I want to know what 14th C Academic Dress looks like!
> 

When I get home I'll give you the reference for what I found when I had a 
similar question. The short version of my own conclusions was "the styles are 
clearly related, but if you showed up at a modern college graduation wearing a 
14th c cap and gown, it would be instantly identified as odd. "

Heather Rose Jones
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Re: [h-cost] painted clothing

[Heather Rose Jones]

Painted "cloths" I rather suspect.  I.e., painted decorative hangings.

Heather

On Feb 27, 2011, at 11:53 AM, snsp...@aol.com wrote:

> 
> Forwarded from another list.
> 
> 
> 
> Ms Harley 53 of the English Brut chronicle records an incident during the 
> uke of Burgundy’s siege of English Calais in 1436.  ...They of Brigges 
> Bruges) made payntet clothes, howe the Flemmynges were att seege att 
> aleis, and how thai wann the toune; and hanget our Englisshe men by the 
> elis... etc
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Nancy
> 
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Re: [h-cost] Queen Maud's wardrobe

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Jan 2, 2011, at 4:38 PM, Emily Gilbert wrote:

> Those are so cute!  Is that a little thrum cap on the Trindhoj Man?

Yup -- although the thrums are sewn into a fabric base rather than it being a 
manipulated-thread base.  One of the advantages of doing the doll-sized 
replicas is that I can do some fairly labor-intensive techniques without it 
taking forever.

Heather

> 
> Emily
> 
> 
> On 1/2/2011 5:28 PM, Heather Rose Jones wrote:
>> I've had a lot of fun making doll-sized replicas of costumes (and other 
>> goods) from archaeological finds.  There are some pictures of theme here:
>> 
>> http://www.heatherrosejones.com/digthatdoll/index.html
>> 
>> Heather
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Re: [h-cost] Queen Maud's wardrobe

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Jan 2, 2011, at 11:13 AM, Emily Gilbert wrote:

> Ooh, post a picture when you're done - and pictures of the other gowns, too!  
> I think the concept of making doll-size historical costumes is really 
> interesting.

I've had a lot of fun making doll-sized replicas of costumes (and other goods) 
from archaeological finds.  There are some pictures of theme here:

http://www.heatherrosejones.com/digthatdoll/index.html

Heather
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Re: [h-cost] Hill & Bucknell Cloaks - sorry for cross-post, but...

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Nov 11, 2010, at 6:42 AM, Laurie Taylor wrote:

> I'm not sure how much overlap there is between this list and an SCA garb
> list, so I hoped for more ideas between the two.
> 
> I am cutting a cloak, the half-circle style as shown in Hill & Bucknell, The
> Evolution of Fashion 1066-1930, c.1100 male/female.  I opted for this one
> because it fit well on my fabric without piecing.  The fabric is a very dark
> charcoal, almost black, woolen-like, though probably acrylic.  It’s what I
> had on hand so, even if the color isn’t period, it’s going to happen.



> Also, quite a few of the cloaks of c.1066-1260 or thereabouts are greater
> than ½ circle and harder to fit on fabric without piecing.  I did the math
> to enlarge one particular pattern, and it would need a piece of fabric
> around 105” x 120” approximately.  How would you piece that, or how might it
> have been pieced in period, assuming that they didn’t just weave a fabric to
> a dimension suitable for that garment?

Looking at surviving examples of medieval half-circular cloaks, where the cut 
is discernable from the available publications, pretty much all of them are 
pieced to some degree.  (This isn't surprising when you compare the style to 
the typical fabric widths in use in the medieval period.)  Most often, the 
basic shape is formed by sewing together strips parallel with the straight edge 
of the half-circle, but very often the area farthest from that straight edge is 
further pieced in order to use up the bits cut off for the curved edges of the 
strip next to it.

Heather
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Re: [h-cost] Opinions on Manesse Codex diagonal stripes

[Heather Rose Jones]

Thanks for the lead.  (The particular costuming project went in another 
direction, but the theoretical question is still fascinating.)  As you note, 
the really problematic aspect for the bias cut is the lack of genealogy.  
(There's a similar problem for that handful of Spanish bias-plaid garments, but 
in that case I'm willing to put more weight on the careful depiction of how the 
pattern behaves with respect to the cloth.  I still have reservations in that 
case on the genealogical side, but ...)

The woven-in-diagonals theory seems quite plausible to me from parallel 
evidence for lozenge patterns.  One of the 13th c. garments at Burgos, Spain is 
made from a silk fabric woven in square checkerboard-style checks (i.e., 
alternating solid colors, not a gingham-style pattern) but set lozenge-wise 
with respect to the grain of the fabric.

Heather

On Oct 30, 2010, at 1:11 AM, Danielle Nunn-Weinberg wrote:

> Hi Heather,
> 
> I don't get on here much these days but this caught my eye because I was 
> pulling my hair out over it lately.  I have seen, a couple of manuscript 
> images and I believe I might have at least one of them *somewhere* of weavers 
> actually weaving the diagonal stripes.  But I will be damned if I can figure 
> out where I have seen them.  I believe one was in a "book of trades" type 
> manuscript, one might have turned up in one of Shelly Nordtorp-Madson slides 
> that she showed us in class one day, and I'm sure one is one of my 
> manuscripts or manuscript related books but I haven't been able to track any 
> of them down yet.  The problem with collecting those sorts of things is you 
> wind up with a lot of books.  Now I'm not saying that those are proof either 
> way, but they open the door of possibility that it is fabric woven that way 
> rather worn bias-cut.  Personally, I have trouble with the bias-cut garment 
> theory as well purely on the garment evolution issue - what did it come from, 
> and what!
  did it become afterwards?  Just my two cents...  If I ever do turn up the 
pictures, I will send them to you!
> 
> Cheers,
> Danielle
> 
> At 11:47 PM 10/20/2010, you wrote:
>> With the caveats that artistic representations aren't always intended to 
>> represent actual clothing construction, and that representations of clothing 
>> decoration are sometimes intended to convey symbolism rather than fabric 
>> structures, and that there are multiple ways to create any particular 
>> decorative effect in fabric ...
>> 
>> What are people's thoughts on the garments depicted in the early 14th c. 
>> Manesse Codex that have diagonal striped designs?  Woven as diagonal 
>> stripes?  Print?  Woven as straight-grain stripes and cut on the bias?  
>> Symbolic interpretation of armorial designs not intending to represent 
>> actual garments?  Some other option?
>> 
>> How is a given hypothesis affected by other stripe-like designs in the 
>> manuscript?  (Primarily horizontal stripes, but also chevron designs.)
>> 
>> Here's a link to an image showing a variety of these designs, just for 
>> reference.
>> 
>> I'm contemplating the plausibility of the bias cut hypothesis, but I'm 
>> failing to convince myself, given that the reasoning that would support it 
>> would also conclude that the diagonal-stripe and horizontal-stripe garments 
>> in the manuscript represent two entirely different ways of cutting garments 
>> that are otherwise identical in depiction.
>> 
>> Heather
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Re: [h-cost] Opinions on Manesse Codex diagonal stripes

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Oct 21, 2010, at 7:42 PM, Sunshine Buchler wrote:

>> What are people's thoughts on the garments depicted in the early 14th c. 
>> Manesse 
>> Codex that have diagonal striped designs?  
>> 
>> Woven as diagonal stripes?  Print?  Woven as straight-grain stripes and cut 
>> on 
>> the bias?  Symbolic interpretation of armorial 
>> 
>> designs not intending to represent actual garments?  Some other option?
> 
> I have a sligthly different possible option: If you cut the stripes on the 
> diagonal and sew them together into a new diagnoally striped piece of fabric, 
> then you haven't changed the grain of the fabric when you go to cut out the 
> garment. I believe Master Vyncent atte Wodegate did this with a later period 
> man's cotehardie, and I remember him saying that it didn't take much more 
> fabric 
> then a normally constructed cotehardie would. (Pictures of it are in the 
> Photos 
> section of the aotc Yahoo group).

*grin* Don't need pictures -- I see it in person on a regular basis.  But my 
current interest in this topic came out of a particular piece of striped 
fabric, so the hypothesis of "pieced and straight-grain" ends up falling in the 
"don't use this fabric for this garment" category.

Heather
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Re: [h-cost] Opinions on Manesse Codex diagonal stripes

[Heather Rose Jones]

Thank you all for your thoughts on this question -- it's been useful to see how 
other people would analyze it.  I think I've confirmed my opinion that the data 
simply doesn't support a conclusion of bias cut at this particular time in this 
particular context -- at least not sufficiently for my own personal standards.  
(I badly needed a reality check after spending too much time last night with 
the graph paper figuring out that I actually _could_ piece the garment from the 
length of striped fabric in question with next to no waste.  But "could" isn't 
"should" and since I'm a bit of a structure fanatic I think I'll go in a 
different direction.)

Heather
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Re: [h-cost] Opinions on Manesse Codex diagonal stripes

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Oct 21, 2010, at 8:53 AM, Schaeffer, Astrida wrote:

> Sigh. Must reconstruct my thoughts, stupid e-mail program erased my message 
> when I hit "send". I hate Microsoft.
> 
> 
> 
> Assuming the patterning isn't a matter of artistic license, I think this is a 
> combination of bias use of a woven stripe fabric, and piecework (constructing 
> fabric out of contrasting strips). Painted fabric wouldn't hold up well. 
> Piecework would have been in the craft vocabulary because of domestic 
> textiles and repair work, as well as to fill in missing corners during 
> garment construction (widening skirts, lengthening sleeves, etc.),
> 
> If a tailor had striped fabric to work with, it isn't a stretch to see him 
> play around with the patterns that so easily pop up when moving one piece of 
> striped fabric around on top of another. Especially given the existing 
> patterning in contemporary architecture, tiles, etc. Chevrons, here we come! 
> 
> My question is: how many of the striped garments depicted in the Codex are 
> diagonals as opposed to verticals and horizontals? 

That's one of the interesting things.  No vertical stripes at all that I can 
find.  Plenty of horizontal stripes of varying widths.  A fair sprinkling of 
the diagonals. (In both cases, sometimes on a particolored garment with half 
solid.)  A very few examples of chevron (zig-zag) designs.

Heather


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Re: [h-cost] Opinions on Manesse Codex diagonal stripes

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Oct 21, 2010, at 8:31 AM, Leah Janette wrote:

> 
> Only a few years later, you find the infamous Spanish diagonal plaids.  
> 
> http://jessamynscloset.com/plaid.html
> 
> They still don't answer the question of "cut on the diagonal or woven that 
> way?" but they don't seem to be an artistic convention for heraldry.  They 
> could not be stripes tacked on afterward (although I think that could be a 
> reasonable possibility for the Manessa Codex garments).

The diagonal plaids I find a far more compelling argument for representation of 
a cut, although I haven't run across any surviving garments that support the 
conclusion.  But part of that is the more "realistic" style of art during their 
era.  But also, in renderings of plaid fabric in garments, there's a strong 
correlation (not absolute, but strong) between the representation of "bias" and 
garments that are more closely fitted while plaids represented as 
"straight-grain" correlate with garments represented as more loosely fitted.  
SInce the Manesse garments are relatively loose, that correlation doesn't seem 
to extrapolate.

Heather
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Re: [h-cost] Opinions on Manesse Codex diagonal stripes

[Heather Rose Jones]

But there's a difference between _whether_ the art represents actual clothing 
details and how _well_ it does so.  The failure to represent how a design on 
fabric would follow the folds of the fabric doesn't automatically imply that it 
doesn't represent an actual fabric design.  That aspect seems to be more a 
matter of the artistic conventions of the time.

Heather

On Oct 21, 2010, at 7:15 AM, Elizabeth H. wrote:

> My first thought is that it seems to be some sort of artistic painting
> convention for depicting a party or performers. If you look at the stripes,
> they don't follow the lines of the clothes or the body - they're painted on
> in straight swaths, whether or not the line crosses an arm or a fabric
> drape. You can especially see it in the cuffs of the sleeves.
> 
> /.2 cents :)
> 
> On Thu, Oct 21, 2010 at 8:56 AM, Genie Barrett  wrote:
> 
>> I think, that with stripes that wide, it was two different types of fabric
>> sewn together.
>> 
>> The one with points may be different, however.
>> 
>> My 2 cents
>> Genie B
>> 
>> On Thu, Oct 21, 2010 at 8:51 AM, Heather Rose Jones <
>> heather.jo...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>> 
>>> Hmm, I seem to have failed at the "paste" part of the process:
>>> 
>>> http://www.huscarl.at/wissenschaft02.php
>>> 
>>> 
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Re: [h-cost] Opinions on Manesse Codex diagonal stripes

[Heather Rose Jones]

Hmm, I seem to have failed at the "paste" part of the process:

http://www.huscarl.at/wissenschaft02.php


On Oct 21, 2010, at 1:07 AM, Patricia Dunham wrote:

> umm, the link to an image didn't come across?? 
> 
> chimene
> 
> On Oct 20, 2010, at 9:47 PM, Heather Rose Jones wrote:
> 
>> With the caveats that artistic representations aren't always intended to 
>> represent actual clothing construction, and that representations of clothing 
>> decoration are sometimes intended to convey symbolism rather than fabric 
>> structures, and that there are multiple ways to create any particular 
>> decorative effect in fabric ...
>> 
>> What are people's thoughts on the garments depicted in the early 14th c. 
>> Manesse Codex that have diagonal striped designs?  Woven as diagonal 
>> stripes?  Print?  Woven as straight-grain stripes and cut on the bias?  
>> Symbolic interpretation of armorial designs not intending to represent 
>> actual garments?  Some other option?
>> 
>> How is a given hypothesis affected by other stripe-like designs in the 
>> manuscript?  (Primarily horizontal stripes, but also chevron designs.)
>> 
>> Here's a link to an image showing a variety of these designs, just for 
>> reference.
>> 
>> I'm contemplating the plausibility of the bias cut hypothesis, but I'm 
>> failing to convince myself, given that the reasoning that would support it 
>> would also conclude that the diagonal-stripe and horizontal-stripe garments 
>> in the manuscript represent two entirely different ways of cutting garments 
>> that are otherwise identical in depiction.
>> 
>> Heather
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[h-cost] Opinions on Manesse Codex diagonal stripes

[Heather Rose Jones]

With the caveats that artistic representations aren't always intended to 
represent actual clothing construction, and that representations of clothing 
decoration are sometimes intended to convey symbolism rather than fabric 
structures, and that there are multiple ways to create any particular 
decorative effect in fabric ...

What are people's thoughts on the garments depicted in the early 14th c. 
Manesse Codex that have diagonal striped designs?  Woven as diagonal stripes?  
Print?  Woven as straight-grain stripes and cut on the bias?  Symbolic 
interpretation of armorial designs not intending to represent actual garments?  
Some other option?

How is a given hypothesis affected by other stripe-like designs in the 
manuscript?  (Primarily horizontal stripes, but also chevron designs.)

Here's a link to an image showing a variety of these designs, just for 
reference.

I'm contemplating the plausibility of the bias cut hypothesis, but I'm failing 
to convince myself, given that the reasoning that would support it would also 
conclude that the diagonal-stripe and horizontal-stripe garments in the 
manuscript represent two entirely different ways of cutting garments that are 
otherwise identical in depiction.

Heather
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Re: [h-cost] St Germain's Hose

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Sep 25, 2010, at 6:16 PM, Althea Turner wrote:

> Does anyone know which museum the garment known as St Germain's hose is in?
> Is there a better picture than the one in Kohler?
> 

The items is pictured and described in:

Schmedding, Brigitta. 1978.  Mittelalterliche Textilien in Kirchen und Klostern 
der Schweiz. Abegg Stiftung, Bern.

which indicates that (at that date) it was held at the Jurassien Museum, 
Delemont, Switzerland.

There's also a photo of it in Boucher's "20,000 Years of Fashion".  Note that 
the authors I've seen discussing this item agree that the association with St. 
Germain (and thus the supposed 7th century date) is certainly false.  
Schmedding is of the opinion that a 12th c. date is more likely.

> Any other images of extant hose, from 4-8th century?

You don't mention whether you're looking for a specific geographic area.  There 
are a few Egyptian nalebinding socks from that general era (Burnham, Dorothy.  
1972.  Coptic Knitting: An Ancient Technique.   Textile History 3 (Dec. 1972), 
116-124.) but they're of a style that seems unlikely to have been popular in 
Europe.

A little earlier than your date-range, there's a pair of woolen cut-and-sewn 
socks from 1st-2nd c. France  (currently at Musée Bargoin, Clermont-Ferrand, 
France).  They're published in a number of places, although none that are 
particularly easy to access.  Probably the most likely to be available is: 

Desrosiers, Sophie & Alexandra Lorquin.  1998.  "Gallo-Roman Period 
Archaeological Textiles found in France" in Textiles in European Archaeology 
(NESAT Symposium 6) ed. Lise Bender Jørgensen & Christina Rinaldo.  Göteborg.

After that, the earliest sock/hose-like items I've been able to identify in 
Europe are include the ca. 10-11th c. nalebinding sock from York (Walton, 
Penelope.  1990.  "Textile production at Coppergate, York: Anglo-Saxon or 
Viking?" in Textiles in Northern Archaeology (NESAT Symposium 3) ed. Penelope 
Walton and John-Peter Wild.  London.)  and the early 11th c. full-length silk 
hose associated with the Holy Roman Emperor Henry III (Schramm, Percy Ernst & 
Florentine Mutherich.  1962.  Denkmale der deutschen Konige und Kaiser.  
Prestel Verlag, München.).

My database indicates that the ca. 7th c. finds at Bernuthsfeld (Germany) 
included a set of leg wraps, but I'd have to look at the original publication 
to see if I meant the sort of unshaped "cloth wrapped around a foot inside a 
shoe, serving as a sock" or the sort of narrow strip used as a wrapping for the 
lower leg.  I suspect the latter.  The citations is from: Schlabow, Karl.  
1976.  Textilfunde der Eisenzeit in Norddeutschland.  Karl Wachholtz Verlag, 
Neumünster.

The following publication also includes something I cataloged as "leg wraps" (I 
can see I need to clarify this in my database coding):  Banck, Johanna.  1998.  
"Ein merowingerzeitlicher Baumsarg aus Lauchheim/Ostalbkreis -- Zur Bergung und 
Dokumentation der Textilfunde" in Textiles in European Archaeology (NESAT 
Symposium 6) ed. Lise Bender Jørgensen & Christina Rinaldo.  Göteborg.

This list isn't likely to be at all complete, but it's what I currently have 
entered into my surviving garments database.  Which this seems a good 
opportunity to plug:

http://www.heatherrosejones.com/survivinggarments/index.html

Heather Jones
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Re: [h-cost] FW: [Alderfolk] Fashion Crisis!

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Aug 19, 2010, at 10:46 AM, Rickard, Patty wrote:

> Comments?
> Thanks,
> Ceit
> 
> To: Marche of Alderford
> Subject: [Alderfolk] Fashion Crisis!
> 
> OK my SCAdian family...I have a book by Tom Tierney on Celtic Fashions. What 
> I would like to know is how reputable is this source? What I am looking for 
> is Irish Celt in the 6th Century. I really like the style on the cover but 
> the illustration states "Frankish Celts, ca 450 B.C."
> PeaceDub Essa/Cliodhna

Offhand, the cover image looks like it was taken from one of those Victorian 
"costume of the ages" books.  But it's also worth noting that the concept of 
"ca. 450 BC Frankish Celts" is nonsensical (the Franks weren't around until 
much later than that and they weren't Celts).  Neither observation provides any 
level of confidence in the historicity of the illustrations.

Heather


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Re: [h-cost] mending by embroidery

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Jan 27, 2010, at 12:40 PM, Nordtorp-Madson, Michelle A. wrote:

One isolated example is the cache of grave clothing from medieval  
Greenland.  I know a lot of people use them as typical for Europe as  
a whole, but that really can't be done.  If you look closely at  
"Woven into the Earth" by Else Østergaard, you will see how they  
were patched.  Again, a good number of garments, but probably  
doesn't say anything about the larger context.




An even richer source of examples of patching from an even earlier  
date comes from the Bernuthsfeld tunic (from Lower Saxony, dated in  
the 2nd half of the 1st millennium) which is almost more patches than  
original cloth!   One of the NESAT volumes has an article looking at  
all the various patches in great detail.


Heather
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Re: [h-cost] Roman question

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Sep 11, 2009, at 7:23 PM, "Laurie Taylor" > wrote:



Hi,

Finally making progress in my quest to build pieces to use in my  
history
class.  The ancients are certainly some of the simplest to build,  
but of
course I have an insatiable need to complicate my life and my  
projects!


So, if you were building a Roman paenula (hooded poncho-like  
garment) in a
thick wool or fake wool (actual fiber not certain), the cut edges of  
which
are pretty stable, how would you sew the seams?  Obviously I'm not  
looking
for serging ideas here.  I am maybe contemplating actually hand  
stitching it

since it doesn't amount to a whole lot of sewing.

I think my question is do we think that they would have lapped the  
edges and
sewn through the layers - no flapping seam allowances on the  
inside?  Or
would regular, plain seams, pressed open or to one side seem more  
likely?


This is NOT life altering stuff here!  I've not gone over the edge  
in a

quest for period accuracy.  I'm just curious.


In researching constructional sewing (as opposed to decorative, that  
is), the most typical seam for wool from antiquity up through the  
medieval period is a lapped or "felled" seam, often with one or both  
of the edges turned under, but sometimes with the fabric simply  
overlapped. The stitch used is typically an overcast stitch. Rather  
than trying to describe it, I'll point you to my article  
"archaeological sewing" on my website at heatherrosejones.com.


Heather 
 
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Re: [h-cost] cloak or woman's outer garment for 15th century

[Heather Rose Jones]

 at 12:34 PM, Zuzana Kraemerova wrote:

Hello,

I recently discovered that I need to make myself a warm cloak or  
outer garment for reenacting events for the 15th century. I was  
wondering about something like garnache - a warm outer garment with  
sleeves. Cloaks are much less practical. But the trouble is, I  
cannot find any sort of such outer garment for 15th century women!
Does any of you know of some illustrations or written evidence that  
would help me? Time and location doesn't matter much as anything  
will help me, but if you insist, I'm acting as a mid 15th century  
middle class woman from France.




This is the general era when women are often depicted in heavy woolen  
gowns with full linings of fur. Being middle class would affect what  
type of fur might be used, but I believe the general idea would still  
be applicable.


For cold conditions, might it be that a heavier, warmer outer layer -  
rather than an additional over-layer - would be appropriate for your  
purposes?


Heather Rose Jones
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Re: [h-cost] 1960s hippie fashions

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Jul 4, 2009, at 12:06 AM, Sylvia Rognstad wrote:

Here's a question for those (like me) old-timers out there.  I may  
be going to a 1960s hippies style event and if so, need to wear a  
costume.  My recollection isn't so good.  Remember what they said:  
"If you can remember it, you weren't really there"?Anyhow, I'm  
trying to remember when long skirts and dresses came in.  I can only  
recall wearing them in the 1970s, but my legs, not being what they  
used to be, definitely do not want to be seen in a mini skirt, which  
is all I can remember wearing in the late 60s.  Along with bell  
bottom pants, of course, which is an option, but I prefer a dress.


What do you early boomers recall?
What I remember is that, when I was in grade school (up through  
'69/'70) we were specifically prohibited from wearing "granny gowns"  
to school, i.e., floor-length "peasanty" style dresses.  The  
prohibition means, of course, that they must have been popular and  
fashionable at the time.  (As I recall it, the prohibition was more or  
less defined by length, but the specific popular style that made it  
necessary was the one nicknamed "granny gowns".  I think they were  
sort of proto-Laura Ashley type dresses.)


Heather Jones (b. 1958, so a middling-to-late boomer)
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Re: [h-cost] CC27 historical judge talks about workmanship and historical interpretation

[Heather Rose Jones]

On May 7, 2009, at 2:19 AM, Käthe Barrows wrote:


What if the judges don't like my historical period?
This shouldn't matter if they're honest.  Case in point, all three  
of us
judges gagged when we saw that someone was entering that 1959 Dior  
outfit.
We' were all old enough to have developed a bad taste for that  
period -
first hand.  (It's stuff like that that made me want to be  a  
Hippie.)  And
every contemporary 1959 detail she showed us, including that stupid  
hat,
only made us gag more.  But she could have walked right out of the  
Vogue
pattern envelope she showed us (all she had was the envelope, and  
she had to
modify another pattern to get what she wanted).  I can't think of  
much she

could have done better (except picking a period I liked).


It's probably bad manners to say this on the list rather than  
privately, but I'm a bit concerned for what the lurkers might think if  
this isn't responded to.


If that had been something I entered, I would be extremely hurt and  
horrified to see a judge talking about it in this fashion.  A hat is  
"stupid" simply because you had a bad experience with '50s fashion?   
An entire historical fashion era makes you gag?  I would find it very  
difficult to trust a judge to be impartial who expresses opinions like  
this.  You say it "shouldn't" matter, but I'd look for a bit more  
evidence that the judges control their rendered judgement better than  
their expressed opinions.


Heather Jones
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Re: [h-cost] Books with scaled patterns (pre 1600)

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Mar 19, 2009, at 7:03 PM, Elizabeth Walpole wrote:


Hi everyone,
I'm teaching a class next month at an SCA event on how to enlarge  
scaled

patterns in books to full size. I was going to include a list of books
relevant to SCA costumers (for those who aren't aware the SCA's time  
period
is roughly 600 to 1600) with scaled patterns, so far I've got  
Patterns of
Fashion 1560-1620, Period Costume for Stage and Screen (both  
Medieval to
1500 and 1500-1900), The Tudor Tailor, The Medieval Tailor's  
Assistant, and
Corsets and Crinolines (although it's only got one pre 1600 scaled  
pattern

I'm using it as an example of a patterns that are not on a grid)
Is there anything I have missed?


Blanche Payne's "History of Costume"?

Heather

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Re: [h-cost] What period/country etc is this tunic?

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Feb 21, 2009, at 7:17 PM, Pixel, Goddess and Queen wrote:



I'd actually say it was SCA Generic Early Period, myself, since it  
looks like he's wearing front-lacing suede boots. :-)


I was going to say something similar but hesitated lest it would be  
too easily be mistaken for a snark (please don't think I'm implying  
that that's what you're doing!).  In particular, I think it would be a  
mistake to assume that the outfit as a whole is intended to represent  
a particular specific time-and-place.


Heather
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Re: [h-cost] Tatting before 1600?

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Sep 1, 2008, at 11:08 AM, Julie Tamura wrote:


Greetings

I have always heard that tatting didn't come into use before the  
1700s and
so haven't been doing it for Tudor/Elizabethan.  Yesterday I was  
told by a
lady that needle tatting can be documented to quite early and she  
said it's
mentioned several times in the Canterbury Tales.  She also  
mentioned that

it's related to making fishing nets.

I'm wondering if any of you knowledgeable folks out there can help  
me.  I'm

having a problem with her data for a couple of reasons.
1)  If tatting shows up in the Canterbury Tales, I know word  
meanings change

over hundreds of years.  Do we know that tatting then is what we call
tatting?
2)  It's quite a reach from fishing nets to the tiny rings and  
picots of
tatting.  I believe they're related but I don't consider net making  
proof of

tatting.


Particularly given the reference to fishing nets, it sounds like this  
is coming from the point of view of "any technique that bears a  
tangential technical resemblance to Technique X _is_ Technique X and  
therefore is support for all forms of Technique X being historically  
appropriate for any time period when those other techniques can be  
found."  It's a fairly common line of reasoning found when the goal  
is to demonstrate the great antiquity of Technique X -- either  
because being older is somehow felt to make the technique "better" in  
some indefinable way, or because the person doing the reasoning is  
fond of doing Technique X, fond of Time Period Y, and wants to feel  
good about doing Technique X in the context of Time Period Y.


If "tatting" is defined as "building a thread structure by means of  
half-hitches formed around a ground thread" then that definition  
includes certain types of needle lace (in addition to including  
shuttle-based tatting, although it then excludes the many types of  
netting that don't use half-hitches).  If "tatting" is defined as  
"building a thread structure by knotting a thread carried on a bobbin  
around existing threads in the work" then that definition includes  
most types of netting (although it then excludes needle-lace).


On the other hand, the Canterbury Tales reference may be a matter of  
a too-eager reading of a more careful statement.  Doing a Google  
search on "Canterbury Tales" + "tatting" turns up the following quote  
from Rebecca Jones' (no relation) "Tatting -- Origins and History":


"Tatting is believed to have evolved from knotting, which in various  
forms is a very ancient type of decoration for clothing. The  
Egyptians used knotting as decoration on ceremonial dress and a mummy  
was found with a skirt overlay of knotted rings which look very much  
like tatting.
The early Chinese also used knotting and couched their knotted  
designs into their embroideries. These eventually found their way to  
Europe and knotting was popular for the decoration of furnishings and  
embroideries in Medieval times - Chaucer even mentions it in his  
Canterbury Tales (1387)."


A careful reading of this statement shows that it only says that  
"knotting" was mentioned in the Canterbury Tales -- not that anything  
that might properly be named "tatting" was.  So while Jones may well  
be guilty of tossing in mention of a lot of irrelevant techniques in  
an attempt to give tatting an air of great antiquity, she doesn't  
appear to be guilty of making specific unsubstantiated claims about  
tatting itself.  (You might want to ask your correspondent if she can  
give you the specific passages in Chaucer that mention tatting --  
many people repeat these sorts of claims at multiple generations,  
like a game of "telephone", without ever questioning the precise  
nature and meaning of the original statements.)


My take on this sort of thing is that if one wants to identify the  
historic context for a particular technique -- which in the case of  
shuttle-based tatting is not simply a fabric built of half-hitches  
using a shuttle, but the specific use of a sliding loop where the  
shuttle thread is knotted around the loop then straightened to  
transfer the half-hitch to the sliding loop itself -- then one needs  
to find clear examples of _that_ technique, not general examples of  
possibly related or possibly ancestral techniques.  But then, I have  
Opinions on this sort of topic.




Heather
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Re: [h-cost] Hose lining

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Jul 30, 2008, at 2:47 AM, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:



I'm not aware of any real research into hosen and linings from  
earlier than

the 16th century.

I'm not aware of any extant hosen (other than the buskins in  
Canturbury

Cathedral, obviusly, but they're 12th century (offhand)).






All this is assuming that you mean joined hose of course.


In terms of joined hose, I've only cataloged one pair earlier than  
the 16th century -- I don't have my full notes in front of me at the  
moment, but they're in one of the German museum photo collections and  
are listed as 15th c.  While the two legs are joined at the  
waistband, they aren't joined across the seat.  The photo doesn't  
appear to show a lining, but I don't know what the preservation  
conditions were -- a linen lining might be lost under many conditions  
where the main fabric was preserved.


On the larger question of extant hose -- if we include anything from  
buskins on up -- I have a couple dozen items in my current catalog  
from the general 8-15th century period.  About half of them are  
ecclesiastical in origin, but during that period they seem to be  
roughly similar in cut to the secular garments.


Heather

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[h-cost] SF Bay Area -- Benefit lecture: Costume Research from Existing Garments

[Heather Rose Jones]

I'll be presenting a day of historic costume lectures this Saturday  
as a benefit for the Vallejo Music Theatre -- see details below.  I  
know there are a number of other distractions for area costumers this  
weekend but there's always going to be _something_ conflicting with  
_anything_.   The material is mostly coming out of my work cataloging  
surviving pre-modern garments (plus a bit of Welsh stuff thrown in  
for leavening).  So if you happen to be in the area at loose ends,  
I'd love to see a good turnout for the theater's sake.


Heather Rose Jones

On August 2, 2008 Vallejo Music Theatre will host an all day class  
at 823 Marin St in Vallejo. Our theme is "Early European Costume  
Research from Existing Garments". Doors will open at 9:30am and  
begin with registration and coffee.  Tickets can be purchased by  
going to our website vallejomusictheatre.org or by calling Vallejo  
Music Theatre at 707-649-2787. The price of $45.00 includes lunch  
and refreshments.


Our classes are:
#1:  Researching Costume from Surviving Garments:  From the Iceman  
to Charles the Bold,
#2:  The Genealogy of Clothing Construction: Stylistic Changes  
Across Time and Space - handout included
#3:  Medieval Welsh Costume: Researching Less-Documented Cultures  
- booklet available for sale


Our program includes morning coffee and pastries, lunch (after the  
first program) hosted by Georgia Street Grill, 314 Georgia Street,  
Vallejo and a dessert, coffee and conversation finale.


Our presenter is Heather Rose Jones.

Heather was born into an academic family, she has lived at various  
times in three of the four corners of the continental US as well  
as three European countries and now currently resides in the SF  
Bay Area. She has a BS in zoology and spent a decade in medical  
research. Later she went back to school for a PhD in linguistics  
(specializing in Medieval Welsh prepositions). She currently works  
in the biotech field in various capacities.


As a member of the Society for Creative Anachronism (SCA), where  
she is know as Tangwystyl verch Morgant Glasvryn.  She loves to  
share her knowledge with anyone who will stand still long enough  
to listen. She is also an author and has several publications on  
language, historic clothing and Wales. The SCA has been an outlet  
for any number of her historic interests, although she has some  
seriously academic outlets as well. Research and teaching are  
great passions in her life.


This is the second event showcasing historic clothing. Last year  
Vallejo MUsic Theatre hosted the authors of "The Tudor Tailor".







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Re: [h-cost] Costume related Thesis of interest

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Feb 8, 2008, at 8:22 AM, Abel, Cynthia wrote:

Thanks for the theses list. I do interlibrary loan and getting a  
thesis loan from another library is about a 10%-25% success rate at  
best.


Just a comment from the university point of view on the question:   
Very often the university has only a single copy of a thesis  
available to the public -- I know U.C. Berkeley only as a single copy  
of mine.  And that one copy is the "proof" that it was ever written  
in the first place.  (My department also has a copy, but it isn't for  
public circulation.)  So the consequences of that copy going  
walkabout while off on interlibrary loan are fairly dire.   This  
might explain why they're a little leery of lending them out.


Heather
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Re: [h-cost] Found it! - Colored shirts in the 16th century?

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Jan 19, 2008, at 9:05 AM, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:



In a message dated 1/18/2008 7:56:13 P.M. Eastern Standard Time,
[EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Barthel_Bruyn_3.png
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Bartholom%C3%A4us_Bruyn_d._% 
C3%84._003

.jpg





I love the huge wide belts with enormous buckles. I've never  
noticed them
before...such wide ones [that orange quilted one in the 1st pic is  
fantastic!]
and worn in this style with the end through the buckle and just  
hanging. I
never  really studied this region before. Is it just a regional   
thing?


The first one looks more to me like gold brocading than quilting.   
Compare the effect to gold-brocaded tablet weaving.  (I'm not  
suggesting I think the belt is tablet-woven -- although I suppose  
that's one possibility -- just that the effect of the brocading  
thread is similar.)


The second picture nicely shows a white shirt/chemise _and_ the  
colored ruffled cuff, which is therefore clearly a different garment.


Heather

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Re: [h-cost] Seeking names in early textile research

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Oct 14, 2007, at 3:59 PM, Robin Netherton wrote:



Passing along a question from a friend that I can't answer myself:
Can anyone point me to which researchers would be the "name"  
specialists studying and publishing about textiles from the Near  
East and Aegean from the fourth and third centuries B.C.?


I know there are plenty of people in pre-medieval periods, but  
because it's not my own area, I can't remember which scholars  
specialize in which periods and places, and I'd rather not e-mail  
all of them to find out.


This is to help a student working in a related material culture  
area in the period of Alexander the Great.


I'm not sure that there are enough textiles surviving from that  
period to support a focused expert.  The only textile that comes to  
mind from that narrow window are some fragments found in an elaborate  
box in a tomb supposed to be that of Philip of Macedon.  (The  
identification may be more certain than I'm making it sound.)  This  
is discussed in Flury-Lemberg's _Textile Conservation and Reserach_  
and mentioned in an article in _Athens Annals of Archaeology_  
discussing the site in general (there's an offprint of this article  
available as:  Andronikos, M..  1980.  Royal Graves at Vergina.   
Athens Annals of Archaeology, Athens.)


Somewhat earlier than that target period, but possible also relevant  
are some textiles from the burial known as "the hero of Lefkandi",  
which is mentioned in Barber's _Prehistoric Textiles_, as well as in  
Popham, Mervyn, E. Touloupa & L.H. Sackett. 1982. "The hero of  
Lefkandi" in Antiquity 56:169-174.


I'm almost hesitant to suggest Barber as a _specialist_ in this  
topic, since she covers such a broad territory, but she probably  
comes closest to fitting the description of anyone I'm familiar with.


Heather

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Re: [h-cost] ancient Egyptian garment

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Sep 25, 2007, at 8:02 PM, Sylvia Rognstad wrote:

I thought I had saved it but now I can't find the article someone  
posted about an ancient beaded Egyptian dress that was discovered  
some time ago.  It included a photo of the garment.  I wanted to  
show my class.  Anyone have the link, if it still exists?


There are a couple of dresses (or fragments of dresses) of this type  
that I've run across.  At the moment I'm away from home, so going off  
what's on the computer, it's cited in "Hall 1981" which I think must be:


Hall, Rosalind.  1981.  "Fishing-net dreses in the Petrie Museum" in   
Göttinger Miszellen:  42:36-46.


But also in:

Hall, Rosalind.  1986.  Egyptian Textiles.  Shire Publications,  
Aylesbury.  ISBN 0-85263-800-0


which is more likely to have a color photo.

Heather



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Re: [h-cost] Valuation of collection

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Sep 23, 2007, at 8:57 AM, Kathy Page wrote:


Hello everyone,

The divorce saga continues. Ugh.

My collection is large enough that it's going to wind up on the  
inventory list for the division of assets. Oh joy. I have to reduce  
my collection to a bunch of numbers.




Just a brief idea:  the method of valuation depends on the purpose.   
If you were setting a value to something for insurance, that would  
different from estimating what to charge for a commission, etc.  It  
seems to me (but IANAL) that in the context of a divorce, the key  
question is "what is the liquidatable value of this property?"  That  
is, supposing that he, physically, were handed half the wardrobe of  
costumes, how much cash could he reasonably expect to turn them into  
on eBay or the equivalent without expending a great deal of time and  
effort?  For that, you shouldn't need to evaluate your specific  
costumes individually -- simply research final sale prices of roughly  
equivalent items (i.e., used custom-made costumes being sold to  
someone they weren't custom-made for) in a market that can be assume  
to reflect fair market expectations.


Heather

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Re: [h-cost] middle ages: braies for women?

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Sep 14, 2007, at 1:03 AM, Zuzana Kraemerova wrote:

Heather: "In addition to the battle-for-the-pants genre, there are  
other images

commonly circulated in the historic costuming community as evidence
for medieval women wearing underpants that -- when examined more
closely -- are using the underpants as a symbol or representation of
women cross-dressing as men.  A typical example is an illustration
from an edition of Boccaccio's "Concerning Famous Women" (De Claris
Mulieribus) for the tale of Queen Semiramis who -- among other things
-- was notorious for having ruled disguised as a man."

Yes, this was one of the two pictures, someone pointed it out here  
(http://realmofvenus.renaissanceitaly.net/library/Semiramis.gif) as  
well. So, one half is explained! I'm still waiting for the reply  
from my friend to tell me where the other picture was from.
But your "gender battle" theory is very interesting, did you ever  
write an article or anything like that about it? I'd long to get  
some more detailed information:-)


I presented it as a paper at Kalamazoo several years ago.  It will  
eventually be available publicly in some form.


Heather

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Re: [h-cost] middle ages: braies for women?

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Sep 14, 2007, at 1:41 PM, Beth and Bob Matney wrote:

I do not wish to imply that all women in all European cultures in  
all times wore some sort of pants under their dresses, but do wish  
to point out a few items still existing that no one has mentioned


The leather "bikinis" (late Roman time period) found in London and  
on display at the Museum of London.


The "Frauenhose von Dätgen, Kr. Rendsburg." Abb. 184-190  (text  
pp78-79) published in
Schlabow, Karl. Textilfunde der Eisenzeit in Norddeutschland.  
Gottinger Schriften zur Vor- und Frugeschichte, Bd. 15. Neumunster:  
K. Wachholtz, 1976. ISBN: 3529015156 OCLC: 2526391


The late period Italian trouseau in the Met (examined in detail by  
one of the list members awhile back).


And this is why I emphasized that my observations on interpreting the  
artistic representations covered "medieval" and "pre-16th century".


Note that the roman leather "bikinis" seem likely not to have been  
"underpants" in the usual sense of the term, but perhaps a  
specialized athletic or theatrical costume.  (Compare, for example,  
withe the feminine athletes in the 4th c. mosaics at Piazza Armerina  
in Sicily who are performing various feats wearing only "bikini"  
bottoms and a breastband.)


I don't know whether anyone has done an in-depth analysis of the  
gender issues around the Dätgen trousers.  I believe the gender  
association is based on skeletal morphology, but I haven't dug into  
the question of how complete the skeleton was -- e.g., whether the  
identification was based on strong evidence like a pelvic girdle or  
weak evidence like the statistical distribution of long-bone  
lengths.  Given that they are similar to roughly contemporary male  
"outer" pants , there's the question -- hypothesizing for the sake of  
argument that the gender of the wearer has been correctly identified  
-- whether this is an example of "feminine underpants" or an example  
of overt cross-dressing.


And for the 16th c. items -- this is the period when we do start  
getting a variety of strong evidence for the beginnings of feminine  
underpant-wearing in Europe.


Heather

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Re: [h-cost] middle ages: braies for women?

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Sep 13, 2007, at 3:50 PM, Schaeffer, Astrida wrote:



As it happens I'm working on a book too, only pesky life keeps  
getting in the way of completion. Sigh.


Anyway, I -DID- run across a rape trial account where the man was  
convicted because he'd had to pull the girl's braies down before he  
could do the deed. Had there been no braies, her status as an  
innocent in the proceedings would have been in question. The  
reference is buried in the disaster pile of research, I'll try to  
find it this weekend


I'd be very interested in more details about this trial -- especially  
time, place, and how the account has been transmitted to us.


Heather

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Re: [h-cost] middle ages: braies for women?

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Sep 13, 2007, at 11:46 AM, Zuzana Kraemerova wrote:


I recently looked through a (not yet published) costume book of one  
of my friends which tells about clothing in the western Europe  
around the 13th and 14th centuries. It is divided into chapters,  
each for one specific garment (like gardecorp, tunic, surcotte...).  
It is supposed to talk about nobility.


Well, in a chapter about women's underwear, I found a picture of a  
woman wearing something like male braies, and another picture  
depicting a woman with a garment that looked like today's pants or  
knickers. It was redrawn, but if I could only remember the source...


The author said nothing and it looked like he was thinking it was a  
general practice for women to wear such underclothes. Well, if I  
remember right, all history of underwear books tell you what a  
scandal it was when (was it catherine de medici?) in the 16th  
century started to wear drawers, inspired by the eastern countries.  
Then, it was actually the 19th century when drawers became common  
and were no sign of scandal or anything else.


It helps to make a clear division between pre-16th century and 16th- 
and-later century when looking at the question of women and  
underpants in Europe, because there's some rather strong evidence  
that Things Changed 'round about then.


Speaking of the pre-16th century era, there is a rather pervasive  
genre of images depicting women wearing -- or very typically, in the  
act of putting on -- a pair of male-style underpants as an act of  
gender-reversal.  Typically in these depictions, there is an  
accompanying man using "female" tools, such as a distaff or wool- 
winder.  Alternately, the woman may be beating the man with a  
distaff.  Sometimes the image is more subtle and the underpants are  
simply displayed prominently between them while other elements of  
gender-reversal are played out.  In at least one wood-carving, the  
struggle is made overt and the couple are playing tug-of-war over the  
pants.


I strongly suspect that the picture in your friend's book is taken  
from one of these "battle of the sexes" depictions.  The problem with  
using these images as evidence for what women were actually wearing   
is that the context presents underpants as not merely a garment worn  
by men, but as a _definingly_ male garment -- i.e., their use as a  
symbol of gender reversal only works if the viewer understands that  
the act of wearing underpants is, by definition, masculine.


In addition to the battle-for-the-pants genre, there are other images  
commonly circulated in the historic costuming community as evidence  
for medieval women wearing underpants that -- when examined more  
closely -- are using the underpants as a symbol or representation of  
women cross-dressing as men.  A typical example is an illustration  
from an edition of Boccaccio's "Concerning Famous Women" (De Claris  
Mulieribus) for the tale of Queen Semiramis who -- among other things  
-- was notorious for having ruled disguised as a man.


I have yet to research an example of pre-16th century medieval  
European art depicting a woman wearing underpants that did not turn  
out to be using the underpants as a symbol of the appropriation of  
masculine identity or masculine power.   But all three of those  
qualifiers -- "pre-16th century", "medieval", and "European" -- are  
important in limiting my observations here.  (I'd say that "pre-16th  
century" is unnecessary when specifying "medieval", but the latter  
can get some very fuzzy interpretations, so it's included more to  
define an early limit.)


When this topic gets discussed on costuming lists, you often see a  
lot of "argument from personal comfort level".  As students of  
historic costume, I think we need to be very skeptical of the idea  
that logical argument and "what feels comfortable/appropriate to me"  
can lead us to an accurate understanding of what people in other  
cultures and other time periods wore.


Heather

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Re: [h-cost] 14th century men's coat?

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Sep 7, 2007, at 1:34 PM, KLH wrote:

I'm looking for examples of 14th century men's coats. I'm not  
particular
about the geographical area as long as it's European. Western  
European is
best, but eastern would be fine in a pinch too. Need to make a  
sleeved coat

for someone, but I want it documentable. Thanks for any suggestions...


You might be interested in looking at the surviving "pourpoint of  
Charles of Blois", which dates to the later 14th century.  If you  
plug that name into the appropriate search field at www.heatherrosejones.com/survivinggarments/choosegarment.php>, it'll  
give you a list of various publications that have information on it.


Heather

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Re: Subject: [h-cost] Elizabethan Gowns - to train or not to train

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Aug 5, 2007, at 5:46 AM, Frau Anna Bleucher wrote:

I am firmly of the belief that while no one looks you in the eye,  
they're certainly not watching where their feet are going either. I  
have a gown that has a very short train (about a foot). In walking  
very quickly and purposefully in a straight line and following  
three other people toward my destination through a light crowd, I  
had my train stepped on no less than 6 times. Not only do people  
not see trains, but they have no concept of personal space.


If I may interject an anthropological note ... "personal space" is an  
_extremely_ culture-dependent concept.  Everyone has a concept of  
personal space; they may simply have a very different one from the  
one you or I is used to.  And even within a culture, personal space  
is highly context-dependent.  A distance that would be unthinkable  
when a second person sits down on an otherwise-empty park bench is  
perfectly acceptable in a crowded elevator.  When it comes to  
costuming and trains, I think there are several issues coming in that  
can be problematic.  We live modernly in a culture where clothing  
trailing on the ground is an accidental fault of which the wearer  
ought to be warned.  So our ingrained concepts of personal space  
really have no _reason_ to take trailing clothing into account.  And  
very often the occasions where we are wearing historic costumes are  
of the "socializing with friends" type, where the default personal  
space is  likely to be relatively short.


It's quite possible (likely?) that in a historic culture where  
someone would be wearing a trained gown, both the nature of the event- 
circumstance and the social standing of the person wearing the gown  
would result in an expected personal space distance that would make  
the train non-problematic.  (Not meaning to pick on your example, but  
how likely is it that an Elizabethan lady who was wearing a trained  
gown would be "walking very quickly and purposefully ... following  
other people ... through a light crowd"?  As opposed to moving in a  
formal and stately manner in the presence of people of lesser rank  
whose attention would be focused on her by default?)


Heather

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Re: [h-cost] volunteering

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Jun 20, 2007, at 9:28 PM, Sylvia Rognstad wrote:



On Jun 20, 2007, at 10:21 PM, Sheridan Alder wrote:

The trendy thing nowadays is asking applicants to provide an  
example of a time that you had to deal with a difficult situation,  
customer, etc. Try to think of something, even if it seems pitiful  
at the time - like, "when my sister tries to pick a fight with me,  
I just walk away and refuse to fight". A safe response might be,  
"I asked my supervisor for advice to deal with the situation".



I so hate it when I am asked that question in interviews.  Doesn't  
everyone unconsciously forget those difficult situations because  
they were so unpleasant?  I have wracked my brain for a good answer  
and have yet to remember one.


It may be "trendy", but it's part of a particular, more extensive,  
interviewing system called "Behavioral-Based Interviewing" -- I got  
trained in it last year so I understand it a bit more from the other  
side.  The idea is that anyone can give hypothetical answers to  
hypothetical questions ("How would you handle ...?") and it doesn't  
mean much in terms of what they'll actually do.  But if you ask them  
for a concrete example of how they _have_ handled such-and-such a  
situation, then you've got a better chance of having something to  
evaluate.  And the thing is, it's much more important that the  
answers be concrete and illustrative than that they be directly  
related to the job you're applying for.  (Job-related is best, of  
course, and it probably helps to preface a non-job-related answer  
with something that identifies it as such.)  Concrete means setting  
up a specific scenario or problem and illustrative means explaining  
what _you_ did in response and what the eventual outcome was.  "Safe"  
responses aren't what the interviewers are looking for -- if the  
interviewer asks how you've handled a difficult situation, they want  
to hire someone who doesn't run from difficult situations and who  
learns from past situations to improve future responses.


When I interviewed for my current job, I was coming off of a decade  
of grad school and applying for a job I had no specific formal  
training for.  My interview responses involved a lot of drawing from  
school experiences (confrontations, managing others, planning and  
executing projects), hobbies (more project planning, interpersonal  
skills) and so forth (my examples of "a time I worked on a really  
effective team" included family camping trips).


If you know you're going to be dealing with this style of interview  
(or think you might be), it can help to create a mental list of  
experiences to use as examples for a wide variety of scenarios.  When  
I've participated as an interviewer using this system, the most  
common pitfalls were answers that gave a scenario but no resolution,  
or that wandered off from the topic and never really got to the  
point.  Googling on "behavioral based interview" can track down much  
more helpful suggestions than my brief sketch here.


Heather
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Re: [h-cost] Question about Viking Fabrics

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Jun 13, 2007, at 4:09 PM, Jodi Nelson wrote:

I am looking for evidence of clothing made of silk in 9th-11th C  
Viking society. Any ideas where I should look?


In addition to the headwear that Cathy mentioned, there are a couple  
of good resources for silk used to _trim_ Viking clothing.   
Specifically the publications on textiles from Birka and from the  
Oseburg find.  In both cases, we're talking primarily about narrow  
strips cut from imported decorative silk fabrics that have been  
applied as trim to some garment (although the nature of the garment  
isn't always identifiable).


Heather

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Re: [h-cost] About Passports Just FYI

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Jun 5, 2007, at 2:47 PM, Sharon Collier wrote:

I have heard that if you go to the Passport office itself, you can  
walk it

through. That was years ago, don't know if it works today.
My son applied for his first passport on May 3 of this year. It  
arrived in

the mail 8 days later.


(WIth the understanding that this is all relevant only to U.S. list  
members )


This is true -- however when I was trying to get a passport in a  
hurry back in March, the earliest one could get the required advance  
appointment was a month in the future.  (I ended up going the  
expedited-by-mail route and received my passport within IIRC three  
weeks.  Alas, in the mean time, my company decided not to send me off  
on a business trip to Puerto Rico and England after all.)


There's a general take-home message:  if you think there's the  
slightest chance that you might have occasion to travel outside the  
country -- ever -- go ahead and apply for a passport now when a long  
delay won't ruin any plans.


Heather

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[h-cost] Help with a query on Middle Eastern clothing term

[Heather Rose Jones]

I received the following query (via my surviving garments web page)  
from an author who needs help verifying a term.  I'll post his  
question below and will forward him anything people can provide to  
help.  (I haven't had a chance to check with him whether it would be  
ok to post his e-mail address on this list, so I figure I can serve  
as a conduit.)


Heather Jones

= = = = =

He writes:

"Hope you can help me. I am in the process of writing my second  
historical novel (the first is The Whale Road - HarperCollins) which  
is partly set in the Middle East, around Jerusalem. I came across a  
reference to a cloth that is woven to shape, neither cut nor sewn,  
and worn by a high-ranking official (emir). The name I have is  
bougameleon, but I have clearly misspelled it, since I cannot find  
reference to it anywhere now - and, to compound the problem, my  
original source material seems to have been lost.
This is now a query from my copy editor that I cannot seem to answer  
- so I hope you can.

Ever heard of it? Anything similar to it?"

= = = = =

So the gist of the question seems to be:

* Islamic Middle East, near Jerusalem (although no guarantees that  
his original source was specific to that location)

* garment/cloth woven to shape, not cut or sewn
* worn by emir (presumably in his original source material)
* name something like "bougameleon"
* needs to verify correct name to satisfy his copy-editor
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Re: [h-cost] hand rolling hems

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Apr 27, 2007, at 3:14 PM, Dawn wrote:


Cynthia J Ley wrote:


Hi all. I need to hand roll a veil hem and have never done it before.
Could someone please give me instructions?


Trim off any fraying edges. Take the edge of the fabric between  
your thumb and finger and try and roll it into a narrow hem. Curse.  
Snip off any frayed bits you caused. Take tiny stitches with the  
other hand. Repeat.


In addition, it can help in achieving a small, tight roll if you  
moisten the fingers you're using to roll it.  I've found that it  
works best to roll the edge back and forth a little between my  
fingers to get the best result.


When I was putting together my article on seam types found in  
archaeological textiles  the rolled hems I found were sewn  
with an overcast stitch -- where the thread goes around the whole  
rolled part then through the fabric at the edge of the roll.  (This  
is as opposed to something more like a regular hem stitch where  
you're just catching the edge of the roll.)  MoL's "Textiles and  
Clothing" notes that this was used for silk veils in the medieval  
period.  I also found mentions of it on linen, but the specific  
examples were from pharaonic textiles.


Heather
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Re: [h-cost] 7th century silk?

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Apr 25, 2007, at 11:31 PM, Elizabeth Walpole wrote:

Hello everyone, first up the short version of the question, does  
anybody know what fabric 7th century Italian or English church  
vestments (specifically the chasuble) would have been made of?
Read on if you're interested in why I need to know. My SCA group  
has been given a quest to find a 'relic' of our patron saint (St  
Aldhelm) I've found a 13th century book on the lives of the saints  
(http://www.catholic-forum.com/saints/golden000.htm for a 15th  
century English translation) which mentions a relic which was still  
on display in the 13th century in the form of a chasuble which was  
miraculously hung on a sunbeam. If we take this source at face  
value and assume that this was really the chasuble used by an  
English monk while visiting Rome in the late 7th century (so it  
could have either been purchased in Rome or taken with him from  
England) would it have been made from silk or wool (presumably not  
linen as it was described as purple)?


If it helps, there is a surviving 8th c. chasuble associated with St.  
Ebbo held at the cathedral museum at Sens, France.  It's made of silk  
and is described in:


Chartraire, E.  1897.  Inventaire du Tressor de l'église Primatiale  
et Métropolitaine de Sens.  Paul Duchemin, Sens


This source only has a text description.  I don't seem to have a  
mention of it in my notes from when I was at the museum, so it may  
not have been on display at that time.  There is also a silk dalmatic  
associated with St. Ebbo held there which (now) is a sort of slate- 
blue in color (the fabric is a tabby weave, not particularly glossy,  
as I recall) and is trimmed by -- I kid you not -- narrow bands of  
woven trim in a "rainbow" pattern (i.e., half a dozen different  
colored stripes in parallel).


For what that's worth.

Heather

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Re: [h-cost] medieval book with pictures

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Feb 24, 2007, at 12:51 PM, Zuzana Kraemerova wrote:

I'm just about to do a gown from the mid 14th century Bohemia- 
German, (could be France, too). It will be for a man from a lower  
aristocratic class. So that's why I'm looking for some inspiration:-))




If you think that surviving garments from early 14th c. Bohemia might  
help you in this research, look into the burial garments of King  
Rudolf I of Bohemia.  If you go to my surviving garments database  
online   and simply select: (Modern) Country of Garment =  
Czech Republic, all the items currently in the database with that  
characteristic are the Rudolf grave garments.  I don't know how easy  
the cited pubications will be to track down, but they include cutting  
diagrams and lots of pictures as well as descriptions.


Heather

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Re: [h-cost] Re: color

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Jan 29, 2007, at 7:21 PM, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:



In a message dated 1/29/2007 7:39:37 P.M. Eastern Standard Time,
[EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:

first  and she said it was green because of plants


I believe the earliest form of chlorophyll was  red.


The amusing thing in this philosophical exercise is that color  
_categories_ don't have any objective existence -- they are an  
epiphenomenon of the physiological structure of light-perceiving  
organs.  To clarify:  light wavelengths have objective existence, but  
the concept that a particular range of wavelengths, albeit with fuzzy  
boundaries, constitutes the color "red" or "green" is a function of  
the particular sensitivities of retinal cells.  Before the existence  
of eyes and brains, there were no color categories to precede or  
follow each other.


Heather
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Re: [h-cost] movie costumes--Egyptian

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Jan 3, 2007, at 8:06 PM, Catherine Olanich Raymond wrote:


On Wednesday 03 January 2007 10:19 pm, Sylvia Rognstad wrote:

Funny you should mention that book.  I just so happen to have made a
photocopy on it in its entirety when I ran across it for the first  
time
a few years ago in a small town library.  Since it was written in  
1920,

I've wondered ever since how accurate it is.  Incredibly detailed, so
I've been wondering.  any consensus among you all?


Shrug.  It's hard to say.  To my knowledge, there aren't really any
archaeological textile finds (as opposed to jewelry and clay  
tablets) in what
was then Mesopotamia  If I'm wrong, I'd be delighted to hear  
about it!


I'm not aware of any surviving textile finds -- but there are a _lot_  
of surviving artistic representations, including a lot of detailed  
and realistic 3-dimensional statuary.  Deciphering some of the  
stylized textures can be interesting (especially the "tufted" look),  
but I wouldn't be at all surprised if an in-depth study could come up  
with some very plausible theories on construction and materials.


Heather

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Re: [h-cost] movie costumes--Egyptian

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Jan 3, 2007, at 7:16 AM, Sylvia Rognstad wrote:

When did this evidence about Egyptian beaded net dresses surface?   
I never heard of it before nor is it in my old costume history  
books.  It's been decades since I studied the history of costume,  
but since I'm going to be teaching it this January I'd really like  
to keep up on recent developments.


I've run across mentions of about 3 of the dresses, not all of which  
were preserved very carefully after discovery.  The main researcher  
who seems to have written about them is Rosalind Hall.  I believe  
there's some discussion in:


Hall, Rosalind.  1981.  "Fishing-net dreses in the Petrie Museum" in   
Gottinger Miszellen:  42:36-46.


and there's a color picture in the "Shire Archaeology" series book on  
ancient Egyptian textiles, which she also wrote.


Heather

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Re: [h-cost] movie costumes

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Jan 3, 2007, at 7:24 AM, Sue Clemenger wrote:


A beaded/netted overgown? How cool is that? ;o) I hadn't heard of that
intriguing garment, so thanks to you and the other poster who  
mentioned it.
I can see now why the designers of AlbertCat's movie might have  
tried to

imitate it.
--Sue



Yeah, it's incredibly cool.  (The same sort of technique seems to  
have been used for beaded-net sarcophagus covers that would include a  
facial portrait of the deceased.)  I had fun making one for my  
"ancient Egyptian doll" -- see <http://www.heatherrosejones.com/ 
digthatdoll/egyptianwoman.html>.  It's about 2/3 of the way down the  
page.  (The doll is about 10" tall.)


Heather


----- Original Message -
From: "Heather Rose Jones" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: "Historical Costume" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: Tuesday, January 02, 2007 9:34 PM
Subject: Re: [h-cost] movie costumes




On Jan 2, 2007, at 5:00 AM, Sue Clemenger wrote:




Not if what she was wearing was obviously knitted.  That's a  
humongous

boo-boo, right there.  Also, the color of the gown sounds really
wrong--is
there any evidence of linens being dyed in Egypt at that time?
--Sue



 From the description, it sounds like it might have been inspired by
a surviving Egyptian "bead net" dress -- a very open network made of
threaded beads.  The one I'm thinking of is basically a tubular
sheath with shoulder straps and at the bottom hem it has a "fringe"
of dangling flower-shaped beads.  _Might_ -- I'd have to see the
original to know if the suspicion holds up.  There's a rather dark
photograph of the item I'm thinking of about halfway down the page  
at:


http://www.thekeep.org/~kunoichi/kunoichi/themestream/sexuality.html

Heather



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Re: [h-cost] movie costumes

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Jan 2, 2007, at 5:00 AM, Sue Clemenger wrote:

- Original Message -
From: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: Monday, January 01, 2007 10:07 PM
Subject: Re: [h-cost] movie costumes



In the one about Joseph, Potiphar and his wife look fantastic! If I
remembershe was in a sheer coral red crinkled gauze shift to  
her  feet

that had a
turquoise knitted over dress, very open in its working,  that made  
the

whole
thing appear like a coral and turquoise  geometric patterned tube  
that

clung
tightly to the body. The naked  body showed thru the bright gauze  
and the

open
work knitted shift had bits  of gold bobbles worked into it...and  
it ended

in
tied tassels at her  ankles. She wore that familiar wig, like a  
big hair

helmet
with hammered gold  leaves that dangled and shimmered all over it.  
The

dark

cole eyes and red  lipsshe looked like she stepped off a Pyramid

wall!



Not if what she was wearing was obviously knitted.  That's a humongous
boo-boo, right there.  Also, the color of the gown sounds really  
wrong--is

there any evidence of linens being dyed in Egypt at that time?
--Sue



From the description, it sounds like it might have been inspired by  
a surviving Egyptian "bead net" dress -- a very open network made of  
threaded beads.  The one I'm thinking of is basically a tubular  
sheath with shoulder straps and at the bottom hem it has a "fringe"  
of dangling flower-shaped beads.  _Might_ -- I'd have to see the  
original to know if the suspicion holds up.  There's a rather dark  
photograph of the item I'm thinking of about halfway down the page at:


http://www.thekeep.org/~kunoichi/kunoichi/themestream/sexuality.html

Heather


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Re: [h-cost] Schuette was RE: question re: floss silks for embroidery

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Dec 30, 2006, at 6:29 PM, Cynthia J Ley wrote:

The Schuette at the library takes two strong men to carry, so  
Wanda's is

the one you speak of?


I don't know about two strong men, but the last time I took the pair  
of volumes out of the library I decided to save my bad back by  
carrying it balanced on my head ... and ended up getting a pinched  
cervical nerve that ended up sending me to the emergency room in  
extreme pain.  So this is clearly a dangerous book in more than the  
usual financial sense!


Heather

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Re: [h-cost] 16th century costume pictures ?

[Heather Rose Jones]

Quoting Dawn <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:


Dawn wrote:

But it looks like 16th century Norse (?) drawings of clothing.   
Check out the pics near the end of women with pipes in their  
mouths  and spinning in hand. At least, I think it's a pipe, it's  
a stick  with fire coming out of it.


Let me try that again. It mangled the link.

http://www.nb.no/nbvev/eksternvev/html/italienske_tresnitt.html




It isn't a pipe -- it's a light source, probably something like a  
rush light, but held in the mouth rather than in a fixed holder.  The  
page title is something like "16th c. Italian prints of Norsemen" --  
the colored prints are all from Vecellio, apparently, and towards the  
bottom of the page there are some comparative examples from a book by  
Olaus Magnus, suggesting that it may have been Vecellio's source for  
some of the images.


Heather
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Re: [h-cost] Event query

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Oct 10, 2006, at 1:46 PM, Ruth Anne Baumgartner wrote:


Hello the list!
A friend sent me this website because he knows I "like this stuff."

http://www.oook.cz/events/hradec-kralove06/

Can anyone tell me what event I'm looking at?


The following web site might give a good clue -- it looks like a  
civic pageant rather than a re-enactment club.




(Hradec Kralove is the name of the town where your pictures were taken.)

Heather
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Re: [h-cost] 15rh century embroidery site

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Oct 1, 2006, at 8:09 PM, otsisto wrote:


-Original Message-

http://medieval.webcon.net.au/period_15th_c.html



 Which ones are your artwork?

De



The line drawings of the motifs on the Mammen page (10th c. Denmark).

Heather

Ah, I see. I remember the site that this info comes from.
Could this person have mistaken the rendering of the fragments as a  
part of

the display of the fragments from the museum?



It would be hard to continue to be mistaken after the correspondence  
we exchanged on the topic.


Did you get to see the fragments up close? The last drawing is  
interesting

in that there isn't consistancy.


I'm working pretty much from published materials plus viewing the  
"reconstructions" commissioned by the Danish National Museum (which  
weren't intended to be reconstructions of the Mammen outfit itself)  
-- the published photos are much clearer to make out than the actual  
original fragments.  The line drawings are redrawn from published  
archaeological reports and tried to follow what can be seen of the  
original layout, which as you note isn't always consistent.  I'd be a  
lot more torqued if it were creative work rather than technical  
drawings, but it's the principle of the thing.  (And for goodness  
sake, the original archaeological reports on the Mammen find are old  
enough that they're out of copyright, so it's not like any one  
_needs_ to steal my art.)


Heather
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Re: [h-cost] 15rh century embroidery site

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Sep 30, 2006, at 11:36 PM, otsisto wrote:

-Original Message-

http://medieval.webcon.net.au/period_15th_c.html




It's a very nice extensive site ... a pity the site owner is still
using some of my original art on it without attribution or permission
after I directly asked for it to be removed.

Heather



Which ones are your artwork?
De



The line drawings of the motifs on the Mammen page (10th c. Denmark).

Heather

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Re: [h-cost] 15rh century embroidery site

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Sep 29, 2006, at 12:09 AM, Suzi Clarke wrote:


At 07:55 29/09/2006, you wrote:


Thought this might interest you.

http://medieval.webcon.net.au/period_15th_c.html



Sorry - meant for a private message but what the heck - it may  
interest some of you too.


It's a very nice extensive site ... a pity the site owner is still  
using some of my original art on it without attribution or permission  
after I directly asked for it to be removed.


Heather

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Re: [h-cost] fabric pattern/designs

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Sep 2, 2006, at 8:51 PM, Susan B. Farmer wrote:


Quoting [EMAIL PROTECTED]:



In a message dated 9/2/2006 9:08:15 P.M. Eastern Standard Time,
[EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:

When did  Paisley begin to be seen in "western European"  textiles?




Some time in the early 1800s, when European weavers began making  
imitation
cashmere shawls--among the first to do so were in Paisley,  
Scotland,  hence the
name.  One of the factoids I enjoy telling people when I give  
talks on  early

19th century costume.


Really.  I had it in my mind that it came from India/Persia (or at  
least *somewhere* in that neck of the woods) and that it was the  
pattern produced by "block printing the side of the hand .


Interesting tidbit nonetheless.  Wonder where I got my erroneous  
info from?


The location is roughly accurate but I've never run across the "hand"  
explanation before.  The motif has a fascinating evolution starting  
out as a stylized "vase and bouquet" motif.  Eventually the vase part  
became vestigial and the bouquet developed that little "droop" at the  
top point and it turned into the familiar current shape.  It was only  
the last evolutionary stage that became popularized in Europe.



Heather
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[h-cost] Surviving Garments Database

[Heather Rose Jones]

I really need to get to bed, so I'm not hitting all the lists with  
this announcement yet, but my searchable database of surviving  
garments up to 1500 is now available in useable form (although expect  
some minor aspects of the interface to change regularly in the next  
couple weeks).  Check it out at:


<http://www.heatherrosejones.com/survivinggarments/index.html>

At some point I'll be interested in feedback, but since I _know_ it  
not only has a clunky interface at the moment, but needs some serious  
data clean-up, it would probably be better to wait for about a month  
and then see if the problems you've noticed are still there.


Enjoy!

Heather

--
Heather Rose Jones
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://www.heatherrosejones.com
LJ:hrj


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Re: [h-cost] Quick lace question

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Apr 18, 2006, at 5:24 PM, Robin Netherton wrote:

Here's the situation: I'm editing an article that refers to  
depictions of
the Virgin in 14th and 15th century European paintings as showing  
clothes
decorated with such rich ornamentations as "ermine, jewels, and  
pure gold

lace." I'm quite familiar with the paintings of this period, and I've
never seen anything in them that could reliably be called "gold  
lace," so
I suspect that the author (not being a costume person) is  
misapplying a
modern term to another type of decoration. She probably just means  
trim
borders or embroidery, but I can't put words into her mouth. In  
asking her
exactly what it is she's trying to call attention to, I need to  
explain

that the wording she's used won't work, because lace (as readers would
interpret the term) wasn't used yet. I'd like to be on firm ground  
when I
say that, and it would help if I could say that "what is commonly  
thought

of as lace trim on clothing doesn't appear until X period; I suspect
you're describing something else."


Something is twigging my memory.  There's a number of paintings of  
the Virgin from roughly that period from eastern Europe that feature  
veils edged with some sort of decorative edging depicted in gold that  
I could easily see someone describing as "lace" for want of a better  
word.  The paintings are fairly stylized and it's hard to tell  
whether the motifs are intended to depict an actual decorative  
threadwork technique or what.  But what it appears to be is an edging  
made either of gold thread or gold in some other form that stands out  
from the edge of the veil in open designs, often with little pendant  
bits.  I'm describing this very badly -- I wish I could find an  
example on the web to point to.  My memory is telling me that there  
are several examples in Sronkova's "Gothic Woman's Fashion", but alas  
I don't own a copy of that book.


But what I'm wondering is whether the author is trying to describe  
something of this sort and accidentally evoking a later style of "lace".


Heather

--
Heather Rose Jones
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://www.heatherrosejones.com
LJ:hrj


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Re: [h-cost] Re: monk underwear

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Mar 17, 2006, at 12:06 AM, Lena wrote:



--- Heather Rose Jones <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
wrote:



There's an even better example in Walter Map's "De
Nugis Curialium"
where he tells a story of a monk whose order
disdained underpants as
being too luxurious, so that when he took a tumble
in the street he
exposed his ... parts for all and sundry to see.
Walter gives the
moral of the story as something roughly equivalent
to "sometimes
discretion is the better part of asceticism".

Heather


Do you know where in De Nugis Curialium this story is?
I've been wanting to follow up this reference for
quite a while, but the book is reference only, and
rather thick, so I can't justify an entire photocopy.


In the 1983 Clarendon Press edition edited by M.R. James, I _think_  
it's in the section numbered i.25 -- the problem is, the excerpt that  
I can find in my files at the moment is only bits and pieces with  
specifically Welsh reference.  I think the item I'm remember about  
the Cisterians and underpants is the one starting at the bottom of  
page 101 of this edition, but since I'm missing the next page I can't  
confirm it.  I really do need to take the trouble to track down my  
own copy.  The problem is I'm holding out for a bilingual edition  
with facing page translation like the James edition, and I haven't  
run across one yet.


Heather

--
Heather Rose Jones
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://www.heatherrosejones.com
LJ:hrj


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Re: [h-cost] Re: monk underwear

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Mar 15, 2006, at 4:41 AM, Gail & Scott Finke wrote:


In latin: (for those who don't trust translations :-)
Femoralia hi qui in via diriguntur de vestario
accipiant, quae revertentes lota ibi restituant. Et
cucullae et tunicae sint aliquanto a solio quas habent
modice meliores; quas exeuntes in via accipiant de
vestario et revertentes restituant.

And in English:
Brothers going on a journey should get underclothing
from the wardrobe. On their return they are to wash it
and give it back. Their cowls and tunics, too, ought
to be somewhat better than those they ordinarily wear.
Let them get these from the wardrobe before departing,
and on returning put them back.


Wow! And I thought "Wear clean underwear without holes in case you  
get in a

car crash and have to go to the hospital" was a NEW sensibility!


There's an even better example in Walter Map's "De Nugis Curialium"  
where he tells a story of a monk whose order disdained underpants as  
being too luxurious, so that when he took a tumble in the street he  
exposed his ... parts for all and sundry to see.  Walter gives the  
moral of the story as something roughly equivalent to "sometimes  
discretion is the better part of asceticism".


Heather
--
Heather Rose Jones
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://www.heatherrosejones.com
LJ:hrj


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Re: [h-cost] OT: self employment tax question

[Heather Rose Jones]

Some general principles to keep in mind on this.  The organization is  
trying to cut costs and increase flexibility.  (This is a truism:   
companies are always trying to cut costs and increase flexibility.)   
When you're calculating how much to ask for, add up _all_ the ways in  
which the organization was spending money on your position:  not  
simply salary and social-security payments, but any benefits you  
received (large or small), plus the clerical work that supported your  
employment, the upkeep on any equipment used, and so forth.  For  
example, a lot of people are mentioning the self-employment tax, but  
as an independent contractor you're also going to be spending _time_  
doing extra paperwork (and quite likely, extra research) to deal with  
legal and tax things you didn't have to worry about as an employee.   
So do the calculation from the other side, too: calculate what it  
will "cost" you (in time or money) to cover all the benefits,  
overhead, upkeep, and paperwork that you didn't have to deal with as  
an employee.


No matter _what_ they pay you as a contractor's fee, they've already  
"won" in terms of flexibility -- i.e., they can decide at a moment's  
notice not to give you any more work.  They can pay for exactly and  
only the work they decide they want without having to keep you on  
payroll when things are slow.  And that means it's not at all  
unreasonable to expect them to pay for that flexibility in cash.  So  
don't feel you're being greedy by setting a high price on your time.   
In fact, try not to spend much time comparing what you're asking for  
as a contractor with what you were receiving as a salary:  it's  
apples and oranges.


This, of course, assumes that they see what you're providing as a  
specialized skill, rather than figuring they can either get someone  
to do piecework at sweatshop wages or pull the Tom Sawyer trick and  
convince someone to do it "for fun".


Heather
--
Heather Rose Jones
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://www.heatherrosejones.com
LJ:hrj


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Re: [h-cost] Obsessed with underwear

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Mar 13, 2006, at 7:30 AM, Robin Netherton wrote:

*coming soon to a volume of Medieval Clothing & Textiles ... vol. 4  
I hope

(right, Heather?)


*meekly*  Yes, ma'am.

Heather

--
Heather Rose Jones
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://www.heatherrosejones.com
LJ:hrj


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Re: [h-cost] Spanish medieval clothes book

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Mar 13, 2006, at 7:37 PM, Lavolta Press wrote:


JAMES OGILVIE wrote:
I just got a fantastic new book today, Vestiduras Ricas.  It is  
the catalog from an exhibit of the extant garments and fabrics  
that normally live in the Monasterio de las Huelgas in Spain.  I  
have seen a smaller catalog from the museum at the monastery but  
when they mounted an exhibit at the Prado in Madrid, they went all  
out with a coffee table size book and all color pictures.   
Unfortunately, it is very expensive (~$75.00) but I think it was  
well worth it.  I got it from http://www.artbooks.com/wc.dll? 
AB~home~&cart=0  , a shop with an incredible selection of European  
art books, most expensive.  It did take a long time to get here  
(this was my Valentine present).

Janet ___



Is it of much use for secular clothing?

Fran
Lavolta Press
http://www.lavoltapress.com



The collection is pretty much entirely secular -- it's primarily  
burial clothing of various nobles whose tombs are at the monastery.   
It's an incredible resource and hasn't been studied in anywhere near  
the depth it deserves to be.


Heather
--
Heather Rose Jones
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://www.heatherrosejones.com
LJ:hrj


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Re: [h-cost] Spanish medieval clothes book

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Mar 13, 2006, at 7:25 PM, JAMES OGILVIE wrote:

I just got a fantastic new book today, Vestiduras Ricas.  It is the  
catalog from an exhibit of the extant garments and fabrics that  
normally live in the Monasterio de las Huelgas in Spain.  I have  
seen a smaller catalog from the museum at the monastery but when  
they mounted an exhibit at the Prado in Madrid, they went all out  
with a coffee table size book and all color pictures.


Unfortunately, it is very expensive (~$75.00) but I think it was  
well worth it.  I got it from http://www.artbooks.com/wc.dll? 
AB~home~&cart=0  , a shop with an incredible selection of European  
art books, most expensive.  It did take a long time to get here  
(this was my Valentine present).


Janet
___


You are a very bad, bad person. [4 books and $200 later] A VERY bad  
bad person.  And I mean that in the nicest possible way. :)


Heather

--
Heather Rose Jones
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://www.heatherrosejones.com
LJ:hrj


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Re: [h-cost] books

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Feb 25, 2006, at 5:46 AM, Suzi Clarke wrote:


At 13:33 25/02/2006, you wrote:
Yeh, I promised myself for years too, then a friend told me about  
librarything. So I'm slowly going through my library and writing  
the ISBN numbers on a pad for 20 -30 books at a time, shelf by  
shelf. With all the resources that Librarything can access, it's  
really not too bad. The books without ISBN do take a little bit  
longer, but I still rarely have to enter all the info.


Beth


Date: Fri, 24 Feb 2006 17:24:29 -0800
From: Joan Jurancich <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>

Not yet.  I've been telling myself for years that I need to do
something like this.  But I'll definitely need a lifetime membership
:-D.  Thanks for sharing the site.



Could someone please explain the point of listing one's books? I'm  
afraid I don't see the point. Mine are all on shelves in my  
workroom. I know what they are, and where they are. Why would I  
need to list them? (More time I haven't got anyway!)


Well, I don't know about anyone else, but for me, after the _second_  
time I bought a second copy of a $100 book because I'd forgotten that  
I already owned it, I started carrying my book list file around on my  
Palm Pilot.  I simply can't remember 4000 books individually, and the  
matter becomes more complicated when I know I've had a particular  
book in my hands but can't remember if it was a library copy, a copy  
in a bookstore that I decided I couldn't buy at the time, or a copy  
on my own shelves.


I use an ordinary Excel spreadsheet -- I'd been entering books into  
it for years already when I got the software to put it on my Palm.   
One of the motivations for setting up the electronic file (other than  
simply having a catalog for documentary purposes, e.g., in case of  
loss) was having a convenient file for pulling citations from when  
creating bibliographies.  At the time, I was doing SCA heraldic  
commentary and was throwing together an extensive list of citations  
for my commentary letters every month.


Different parts of the library got entered into the file at different  
times, based on usage.  It helped that around the time I was getting  
serious about it, I had a move that was leisurely and stress-free  
enough that I could catalog the books as I packed them.  There are  
still a few parts of my library that haven't been catalogued  
(especially the sheet music) and when I do a major bookshelf  
reorganization this year I should probably do a formal shelf-check as  
well.


As someone else noted, it's also a convenient place to keep track of  
who you've lent books out to and whether they've come back.


Heather

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Re: [h-cost] French seams was RE: Quality of clothing, Was: patterns

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Feb 25, 2006, at 7:27 AM, Beth and Bob Matney wrote:

Does anyone know when "French" seams were introduced? I haven't  
been able to find an existing example in the SCA period (prior to  
1600).




A lot depends on how specifically you're defining "French seams".   
There were a lot of different ways of creating seams with finished  
edges pre-1600, often depending on the type of fabric involved.  For  
a non-exhaustive survey taken from archaeological textiles, check out  
the article "Archaeological sewing" on my website (see sig line).


Heather
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Re: [h-cost] 10th - 11th C. German

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Friday 17 February 2006 12:11 am, Heather Rose Jones wrote: [snip]


There isn't so much a "problem" with the neckline as that it's a
rather unusually shaped neckline.  The particular angle of the
photograph is also not very good for seeing what's going on with the
neck.  Asymmetric "side-opening" necklines are quite common among the
surviving garments of this era (what few there are).


On Feb 17, 2006, at 12:29 AM, Sharon at Collierfam.com wrote:
OK, so I'm showing my ignorance, but why "side-opening" necklines?  
I'd think

they'd be more difficult than symmetrical, center front openings.
Sharon



What follows is largely off-the-cuff speculation, but the answer is  
most likely to lie in how these openings developed historically.  The  
most common neck opening configuration of the Roman Empire and sub- 
Roman era was a horizontal slit, sometimes with slight dishing on the  
front side of the opening.  In garments woven in one piece on wide  
vertical looms, this slit could be created during the weaving  
complete with selveges (on the loom, it would be positioned  
vertically during weaving).


Modifications to this neckline style in the early medieval period  
include a lot of things other than center-front slits, and seem to  
have developed from different motivations and for different  
purposes.  Examples include:


Narrowing the opening-as-worn by fastening the front and back edges  
together closer to the (wearer's) neck, as we see in the 8th century  
tunic associated with St. Ebbo, where there is a button-and-loop  
closure on each shoulder.


A double layer of fabric in the body of the garment, with vertical  
slits in the layers on alternate sides of the neck, each fastening at  
the top, so that when closed the inner and outer fabrics overlap and  
there's no direct "hole" from the outside to the inside of the  
garment.  This is seen in the very detailed technical drawings of the  
11th c. Danish "Viborg shirt" and also appears to be the underlying  
construction in the 12th c. alb of William II of SIcily (another  
garment where the decorative parts are original but the garment has  
been re-made at various times).


If you visualize enlarged neck openings developing from a horizontal- 
slit opening rather than a circular opening, then if you start the  
vertical slit at the side of the existing horizontal slit, you end up  
with only one "corner" to deal with, rather than the two corners you  
get if you position the vertical slit in center front.  Also, a  
number of the early side-opening necklines incorporate a decorative  
vertical band as part of the slit, and garments of the early medieval  
period often already had a vertical decorative band approximately at  
the side of the neck opening, deriving from the clavii.


Just  a few thoughts on the topic.

Heather
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Heather Rose Jones
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Re: [h-cost] Byzantine Dress

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Feb 17, 2006, at 2:39 PM, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:

Has anyone heard about this Byzantine Dress book, or its author,  
Jennifer Ball?


http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1403967008/103-0624918-7671817? 
v=glance&n=283155


It seems to have just been published. I sure wish I could afford  
it, although it's slightly later than my precise period of interest.


It's published by Palgrave, who tend to be well-represented on my  
bookshelves among academic publishers.  I would assume that this is a  
bookification of someone's dissertation.  (It's gone on my mental   
list of books to check out in the dealers' room at Kalamazoo -- I  
don't know that I'd buy it sight unseen.)


Heather

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Re: [h-cost] 10th - 11th C. German

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Feb 16, 2006, at 9:29 PM, Catherine Olanich Raymond wrote:


On Friday 17 February 2006 12:11 am, Heather Rose Jones wrote:
[snip]


There isn't so much a "problem" with the neckline as that it's a
rather unusually shaped neckline.  The particular angle of the
photograph is also not very good for seeing what's going on with the
neck.  Asymmetric "side-opening" necklines are quite common among the
surviving garments of this era (what few there are).


I'm familiar with asymmetric necklines (the color photograph on  
Cynthia
Virtue's page to which I referred the original poster has one, in  
fact).  But
the black and white photo in question appears to have an extra band  
appearing

in the middle of what looks like a *symmetrical* neckline.


Yeah, the decorative band has a deep "V" on the (viewer's) left, but  
then the right side of the "V" merges into a squared-off U on the  
right.  The "U" part is deeper and is the actual opening.  One  
problem in interpreting this garment is that -- if I'm remembering  
correctly -- the decorative bands are the only original elements and  
have been re-applied to different bodies over the years.


Heather

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Re: [h-cost] 10th - 11th C. German

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Feb 16, 2006, at 7:32 PM, Catherine Olanich Raymond wrote:

On Thursday 16 February 2006 3:14 pm, [EMAIL PROTECTED]  
wrote:
   I hope someone can assist me.  One of the members of my  
"household"
wants to  take a look at what a 10th to the 11th C. German man  
would have
worn.   I tried to look through the net - but must not of worded  
my search

correctly because I could not find anything.


Try the page I have given the URL for below.  There's a sumptious  
color
picture of a royal dalmatic (i.e., a tunic) in the Kunsthistorische  
Museum,
Vienna from about 1130 C.E.  (it's about a third of the way down  
the page).
An ordinary German man would not have worn anything of silk, or  
with such

sumptuous embroidery, but the cut likely would have been similar.

There's a black-and-white photo of an earlier German tunic on the  
same page,
but there's a problem with the neckline as it's shown there--you'll  
see what

I mean if you look at it.


There isn't so much a "problem" with the neckline as that it's a  
rather unusually shaped neckline.  The particular angle of the  
photograph is also not very good for seeing what's going on with the  
neck.  Asymmetric "side-opening" necklines are quite common among the  
surviving garments of this era (what few there are).


Heather

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Re: [h-cost] 10th - 11th C. German

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Feb 16, 2006, at 12:14 PM, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:

   I hope someone can assist me.  One of the members of my  
"household" wants to  take a look at what a 10th to the 11th C.  
German man would have worn.   I
tried to look through the net - but must not of worded my search  
correctly

because I could not find anything.
  Would the German people at this time be considered the Franks?   
Any suggestions would be helpful.

   I'm trying hard to get more of my group to join this list.  :-)


There are a few surviving garments form Germany during this era.  On  
the ecclesiastical side, there are fairly extensive sets of grave  
clothes from St. Ulrich (at Augsburg) and from Pope Clement II (at  
Bamberg).  Surviving secular clothing from 10-11th c. Germany  
primarily include some of the earliest items associated with the Holy  
Roman Emperors, including some embroidered bands from a tunic,  
several half-circular cloaks, and a pair of full length cloth hose.


Publications covering some of these garments include:

Bayerischen Nationalmuseum.  1955.  Sakrale Gewänder des  
Mittelalters.  Ausstellung im Bayerischen Nationalmuseum München.


Bernhart, Joseph.  1955. "Bischof Udalrich von Augsburg" in Augusta:  
955-1955.  Verlag Hermann Rinn.


Müller-Christensen, Sigrid.  1953.  "Konservierung alter Textilien"  
in Deutsche Kunst und Denkmalpflege, 1953/1:28-35.


Müller-Christensen, Sigrid.  1955.  "Die Konservierung der Augsburger  
Ulrichsgewänder" in Deutsche Kunst und Denkmalpflege, 1955/2:111-116.


Müller-Christensen, Sigrid.  1960.  Das Grab des Papstes Clemens II.  
im Dom zu Bamberg.  Verlag F. Bruckmann, München.


Muthesius, Anna.  1997.  Byzantine Silk Weaving AD 400 to AD 1200.   
Verlag Fassbaender, Vienna.


Ritz, J.M.  1955.  "Ausstellung Sakraler Gewänder des Mittelalters in  
München" in Deutsche Kunst und Denkmalpflege, 1955/2:117-120.


Schramm, Percy Ernst & Florentine Mutherich.  1962.  Denkmale der  
deutschen Konige und Kaiser.  Prestel Verlag, München.


 "Textilien in Schwaben" in  Suevia Sacra.  1973.51-216, pl. 
188-214.


Wardwell, Anne E.  1974.  "Archaeology and Medieval Textiles" given  
at Irene Emery Roundtable on Mueseum Textiles.


Heather

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Re: [h-cost] extant wardrobe inventories

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Jan 31, 2006, at 5:21 AM, Joan Jurancich wrote:


At 04:44 AM 1/31/2006, you wrote:

I've seen the word "Exant". What does this mean in costume terms?
[snip]


It just means that the inventory of the wardrobe still exists.  We  
don't have very many extant (i.e., surviving) clothing pieces.


It depends on what you mean by "very many".  Compared to how many  
were made and worn--no.  Compared to how many people _think_ are  
still extant -- you might be surprised.  (I know I have been.)


Heather

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Re: [h-cost] 17th Century French hunting dress

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Jan 17, 2006, at 1:37 PM, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:

Hi guys. I'm making a loose interpretation of this outfit, and I  
know nothing about this period:


http://www.costumes.org/history/leloir/vol10/48_1692.jpg

Can someone tell me about the sash she's wearing? What's it made  
of? Did it have a purpose, or did it just look pretty?


Also, the skirt appears to be divided in the center front. Is it  
open to reveal a petticoat, or is this a split skirt or culottes?


Women's riding habits (and I'm guessing this hunting outfit falls in  
the same genre) were often inspired by men's military dress.  I'm  
guessing that if you looked at late 17th c. men's military outfits,  
they'd include a sash of this sort as a belt.  SImilarly, the front  
skirt closure looks like it's a take-off on a frogged military coat.   
My instinct says it would be unlikely to be a split skirt at that date.


Heather

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Re: [h-cost] Re: drawers

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Jan 12, 2006, at 11:11 AM, Kathy Page wrote:


I've been quiet and watching this convresation evolve,
and honestly I have been enjoying myself. It gives
food for thought as to why these underwear, and
another Venetian pair that indeed look like men's
breeches, exist in the first place. It also further
develops the question as to why one of them is stained
in a strategic place.




I'd like to note that the conclusion "medieval European women are  
portrayed wearing underpants only as a symbolic appropriation of  
masculinity" applies specifically to the medieval era.  By the 16th  
century in both Italy and Spain (somewhat earlier in Spain than  
Italy) the social rules had clearly shifted.  And outside Europe, the  
"pants=masculinity" equation can't be assumed at all.


Heather

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Re: [h-cost] medieval quote on underwear

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Jan 10, 2006, at 11:40 AM, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:


And why was it more common for men to wear underwear and not women?

I betcha I'm going to be quite embarassed by the obvious reasons.  :-)


There's a lot of evidence that medieval Europeans considered  
underpants to represent "masculinity" in a symbolic way.  That is,  
men wore underpants and women didn't because underpants were  
intrinsically a masculine garment.  This may seem like a circular  
argument, but social attitudes towards gendered clothing always seem  
to end up that way.  For a 21st century comparison, substitute  
"dresses and women" for "underpants and men".  There's no logical  
reason why women wear dresses and men don't other than because  
society says that dresses are an inherently feminine garment and  
therefore it's inappropriate for men to wear them.  All the logic and  
reason in the world can't fight it.


Heather

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Re: [h-cost] Re: Italian Underwear

[Heather Rose Jones]

Date:  Fri, 6 Jan 2006 07:48:17 -0500 (EST)
From: Kathy Page  <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: [h-cost] Italian  Underwear

I am gearing up for my visit to the Met to document
their 16th century  Sicilian Bride underpinning
collection and a pair of chopines.
This delay  has proven fortuitous in that the curator,
knowing how much we are trying to  cover in a short
period of time, gave us an additional 2 hours with  the
collection, totalling 6 hours of delerious pleasure
with 2 pairs of  drawers, 2 chemises, a shirt, a pair
of stockings and a pair of chopines.


On Jan 8, 2006, at 9:53 PM, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:

Um, I have a rank newbie question. I was always told that ladies  
didn't  wear
drawers in this period. Is that a myth, or a regional thing,  
possibly? I

usually do English.

And I've always suspected that it couldn't be true. I've BEEN to  
England.  It

gets COLD there.

Thanks for your forbearance,
Tea Rose



My observation, in my research on this general topic, is that logic  
and practicality are absolutely no guide to the attitudes of a given  
culture at a given period towards women and underpants.  Women either  
wore them or didn't wear them because it was the appropriate thing to  
do in their social context and not for any other objective reason.


Heather

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Re: [h-cost] What periods for these fabrics? (long)

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Dec 2, 2005, at 9:40 PM, Catherine Olanich Raymond wrote:


On Friday 02 December 2005 3:55 pm, Robin Netherton wrote:
[snip]

Clearly there's some dyed linen floating around in medieval  
Western Europe
-- e.g. there's a surviving garment with black linen lining, IIRC  
-- and I
want to make very sure no one thinks I'm saying there was no linen  
dyeing
done in this period. But I don't think it's safe to assume from  
that that
the linen was frequently dyed, and that dyed linen was typically  
used for

the visible layers of clothing, which is what my focus was in my
earlier post.



I know of no examples of linen outerwear from the later Middle  
Ages.  However, in an essay published in "Cloth and Clothing in  
Medieval Europe" Inga Hagg published the results of a stratographic  
analysis of grave finds at Birka, which indicated that some of the  
linen fragments found did not come from a shift (i.e. underwear)  
but from a "caftan" or "mantle"--an outer garment.  In a different  
essay (of which I've read reports but do not have a copy) she has  
posited that some of the outerwear layer linen fragments belonged  
to the so-called "apron dress".  To my knowledge, however, the  
Birka linen fragments have not been exposed to the sort of analysis  
that would enable a determination of whether they had been dyed or  
not.


It also strikes me that those descriptions don't rule out the  
possibility that the linen was used as a lining for the caftan or  
hanging dress respectively.  (I keep forgetting what the current  
standard English term is for the not-an-apron dress.)


Heather

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Re: [h-cost] Seam finishing on wool

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Dec 2, 2005, at 9:39 AM, Caroline wrote:

I have just finished the long seams on a new 10th/11th century  
woollen tunic
for my husband.  In the past  I would now switch on the zig zag and  
do the
bits that are likely to fray with that. I've only ever hand sewn  
hems before
(what the public can't see etc)   However,  I have just spent a  
month doing

run and fell seams on a linen tunic and it would be nice to finish the
woolly one also by hand.

I have had a look at the York and London stiches and the main  
option seems

to be to flatten the seam and put a running or whip stich up the seam
allowance.  The running version would I think leave two parallel  
lines on
the front of the garment (either side of the seam) and the whip  
stich might

leave a series of diagonal lines on the front.

Does anyone have any other techniques they know about or have  
tried.  I
don't think run and fell is particularly aproproate the seam would  
probably

be rather bulky.


I'm not sure if this will work with the sewing you've already done,  
but when I was researching my article on seam types found on  
surviving textiles <http://www.heatherrosejones.com/ 
archaeologicalsewing/index.html> by far the "standard" wool seam  
treatment from the iron age through the medieval period seems to have  
been a fell-type seam.  Often these seem to have been designed so  
that there was never more than three layers of fabric at any one  
point.  But the diagrams at the article may give you some other  
inspirations.


If the wool is fairly springy or has much of a nap, I wouldn't expect  
the stitches to show unless they're fairly big.  On the other hand,  
you could always treat any visible stitching as a deliberate design  
element!


Heather

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[h-cost] the perennial colored linen topic

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Dec 2, 2005, at 6:37 AM, Sue Clemenger wrote:

I think the thing is, with the dyed linens, that there's not a lot  
out there
supporting the existence of *dyed*  *linens.*  Dyed fabrics, yes,  
but not
linens.  Linens, yes, but not dyed. ;o)  At least, not in the part  
of the
world/time most often explored in the SCA.  Really don't know much  
about the
uses of colored linens after the introduction of coal-based dyes.  
(19th

century, right?)
That said, though, a lot of enthusiasts in my crowd use it as a  
reasonable
alternative to wools for summer garb.  Wool can be really hard for  
us to

find at all (weird, considering the winter climate here), let alone in
summer-appropriate weights, as we get temps unheardof in England or  
Ireland
or some parts of Continental Europe.  So linen shows up used for  
cottes or

gowns or jackets or tunics or


It's a recurring discussion, and it always ends up being important to  
distinguish between linen as a "fashion fabric" (i.e., an external  
intended-to-be-visible layer) and the question of "any colored linen  
at all".  The two examples I find easiest to cite of colored linen in  
the later medieval period are a pinkish (sort of salmon-colored)  
linen lining used in some (or perhaps all) of the well-known  
Vestments of the Order of the Golden Fleece and a dark greyish-black  
linen used for the lining of the "satin coat of Charles the Bold".   
These examples speak to the technological question of whether dyed  
linens were available in certain parts of the medieval period, but  
they don't speak to the plausibility of using colored linen as a  
substitute for colored wool as a fashion fabric (which is what many  
people are looking for support for).


Heather

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Re: [h-cost] crochet

[Heather Rose Jones]

On Nov 19, 2005, at 7:05 AM, Bonnie Booker wrote:




Bonnie mentioned:


...thousands of "hooks and crochets" listed in the inventory of the
belongings of Queen Mary I of England when returning to the court  
of her

father, King Henry VIII.



Yes, but from the surviving specimens and the way they are  
described in
the inventories, these are clearly "dress hooks" (imagine the hook  
part of
giant hook-and-eye fasteners). They have a semi-circular open  
hook, less
than 1 inch of shaft, and end with a flat plate pierced with holes  
for

sewing onto the garment. They would be impossible to use as tools.



(I think this is Bonnie again, despite the quote-layering)

I differ with you, but not being able to time travel, neither of  
us can
present definitive proof. There is clearly lace on the collars,  
cuffs, and
headpieces of the time. Also what looks to be lace on the  
passements that

time and before. It may or may not be. This does not pass away the
"crochets" part of the listing nor why it is listed in conjunction  
with the
hooks. Some people have also said it is buttoning hooks. Crochets  
could be
anything from heavy yarns for bedhangings to decorative fine lace.  
There was
also mentions of Elizabeth being fond of her fine chain  
headpieces. Again,
may or may not be. There is no conclusive evidence either way. It  
seems to

be too much circumstansal evidence to say nay.



Keep in mind that the word "crochet" originally simply means "hook"  
-- before the use of the word for a specific type of thread-work, the  
phrase "hooks and crochets" would simply mean "hooks, and hooks-by- 
another-name".   There's no historic context for considering that the  
phrase in a 16th c. document can only mean "hooks and threadwork made  
with a hook".


Heather

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Re: [h-cost] Archves (was Strange spinning question)

[Heather Rose Jones]

At 12:57 PM -0500 10/18/05, Marc Carlson wrote:

From: WickedFrau <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
I don't have a whole lot to add to the discussion except that it has
been discussed on our list before.  Might want to check the archives.


I would be surprised if it hadn't been previously discussed, but 
couldn't find anything in the archives for Byssus, Bissus, Sea silk, 
seasilk, etc.  I even tried fish wool.  I'm  open for suggestions on 
key words to try.


Having remembered some sort of discussion on this term before, I 
searched in my archives and turned up a thread on the Historic-Knit 
list where I'd done a little research into the history of the words 
involved.  Here's my posting from that list, along with the preceding 
context.


Heather
===
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
From: Heather Rose Jones <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: [HistoricKnit] Re: Greek mussel beard gloves
Cc:
Bcc:
X-Attachments:

At 8:02 PM -0700 7/28/03, Chris Laning wrote:

At 5:36 PM -0600 7/28/03, Rebecca Perry wrote:

Today I was watching Jacques Pepin and Julia Child cooking together on TV,
and he said something about Greek fishermen making gloves out of the
"beards" of mussels. I googled and found a couple of off-hand mentions of
this, but no details. Has anyone else ever heard of this?


I have -- I saw it mentioned in (of all things) a book about cooking seafood.

Mussels do secrete threads of a very strong substance that looks very
much like silk, in order to attach themselves to the rocks they live
on. The stuff is called "byssus." Apparently it's supposed to be a
lovely golden color and to make very fine yarn. I don't, however,
have any evidence that people actually _used_ this stuff, and I'd
love to know whether there actually is such evidence or whether this
is just a story. (I'd also think it would be rather hard to process
and would take a lof of cleaning before you could use it.)

The one time I've seen it mentioned is in a book on medieval textiles
in Switzerland (Mittelalterliche Textilien in Kirchen und Klo:stern
der Schweiz_ by Brigitta Schmedding) where there are some very
fragile scraps of a veil-like material that have been labeled as
"byssus." However determining what they actually are is complicated.
Apparently it's very difficult to tell byssus from silk except
possibly under a microscope, and the current consensus about this
fabric is that it probably is just silk. I'd love to know if there's
any more information out there.

(P.S. Just to complicate matters, there is also at least one plant
fiber called "byssus," not too surprising since I think that's just


It's even more complicated than that.  "Byssus" (Greek "byssos", from 
a Semitic root) starts out meaning "an extremely fine linen", 
although the word was later extended to (or misinterpreted as 
referring to) similarly fine cotton or silk fabric.  (See, e.g. Lewis 
& Short's Latin dictionary, Lidel & Scott's Classical Greek 
dictionary, OED.)  I can't find any mention of the use of the word 
"byssus" for the mollusc filaments earlier than the late 18th 
century, which is also when the first mention of people using these 
fibers for textiles starts showing up (OED, ref. William Beck's "The 
Draper's Dictionary").  But it's clear that the mollusc filaments 
were named after the linen textile because of their fineness.


I would tend to assume that any medieval reference to byssus would be 
to the linen fabric (or to the silk or cotton analogs).  I suspect 
that a fair amount of the confusion comes from a greater modern 
familiarity with the term in reference to shellfish than in the older 
usage.  That is, you get people reading an early reference to 
"byssus" and assuming that it means the mollusc filaments, and 
perhaps then elaborating on that concept by assumption only.  It 
seems to me that one clear distinction between silk and mollusc 
byssus would be the length of the fibers.  (Beck's mention describes 
the mollusc byssus being spun to produce a thread.)  Unless you've 
got an underwater byssus farm where you're attaching weights to the 
end of the byssus thread and drawing it out as the mollusc produces 
it, I don't see how you're going to get fibers longer than a few 
inches.


In fact, I'd want to see someone go through the process of turning 
mollusc byssus into cloth before I'll be convinced that it's a 
plausible process, rather than being a myth produced by a 
misunderstanding, similar to the "vegetable lamb".

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Re: [h-cost] belted houppelandes

[Heather Rose Jones]

At 9:54 AM -0700 9/3/05, Kathryn Parke wrote:
Could someone walk me through the process of belting a houppelande 
just below the bustline?  How did they keep the belts there, without 
having it "walk" itself down to the natural waistline?  Was it 
tacked in places, and if so, wouldn't that interfere with the drape? 
And how were they fastened in back -- buckled, tied, pinned?  This 
is for a stage costume, "accuracy" isn't the primary goal (don't 
hate me!) -- I want that look, but I'm not sure how best to achieve 
it.


Although this isn't a style that I wear very often (except for the 
masculine version with the more natural belt-line), my experience has 
been that if your belt is wide and relatively stiff, e.g., made from 
oak-tan leather, then if you buckle it rather snugly just under the 
breasts, the lower edge will ride right around where your waist 
starts flaring to the hips.  (Women with a relatively long waist or 
narrow hips will have a different experience than me.)  If you 
remember that the fashionable silhouette of the time included a 
gently rounded belly, it seems plausible that this method may have 
been part of how it worked.


Another factor may be that if your gown fabric is relatively heavy 
(as seems to be the case from how it is depicted) and the gown is 
relatively flared (ditto), then the change in volume of fabric 
between the upper and lower edges of the belt may also help keep it 
from slipping downwards.


Heather

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Re: [h-cost] Gore problems

[Heather Rose Jones]

At 10:55 PM -0500 8/29/05, Robin Netherton wrote:





On the linen shirt of St. Louis, I believe the gore top is pointy, but the
attachment of the point is reinforced by thin strips that bind the long
seams of the gores and extend beyond the gore point by an inch or two,
crossing at the point. I should note that the handwork on that shirt is
unbelievably delicate -- the stitching on the binding is so very small,
and the seam allowances trimmed quite close (something that requires a
fine linen with a high thread count). But clearly they felt they needed
something to keep the point from tearing out at that spot, where the seam
allowances would have been vanishingly small. Heather can probably speak
more about the sewing methods here; she's the stitch expert ;-)


Although Burnham (and everyone who follows her) shows this gore as 
having a pointed top, this is a misleading simplification.  The gore 
is actually slightly gathered at the top, and so the actual "pattern 
piece" must have a somewhat flattened top.  I don't know that we can 
conclude that the binding was intended to reinforce the top of the 
point -- although it may well have had that effect.  _All_ the seams 
on this garment are finished with a tape binding, and the extension 
of the tapes into an overlapping "X" at the top of the gore, 
similarly to the same effect at the center front of the neck facing, 
seems to be designed to cope with the acuteness of the angle (i.e., 
rather than trying to turn the corner with a continuous tape).


Heather
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Re: [h-cost] Query, cloth terms

[Heather Rose Jones]

At 10:42 PM -0500 8/26/05, Robin Netherton wrote:

A friend is sending off some scholarly material to a publisher, and wants
to doublecheck some information. She got it from a published source, but
it's a bit out of her area, and she wants to make sure the source hasn't
been superceded (or wasn't incorrect in the first place).

So -- I'd love to know if anyone has any hesitations about the following
passage, which is her own wording based on the published information. The
context is 12th c. France:

Commercial relations with the Orient expanded rapidly, bringing
cendal, a silk similar to our modern taffeta, often red, paile, a
brocaded silk from Alexandria, siglaton, a gold brocade for luxury
garments, osterin, a purple silk, and samite, a heavily
embroidered silk, often with precious metal.

Cendal, paile, siglaton, osterin, and samite are all italicized. I believe
she is secure about the fabric words themselves; it's the definitions she
wants to verify.


In technical textile contexts, I have generally seen "samite" used 
_currently_ to describe a type of weave -- the sources I can lay 
hands on at the moment describe it as a 1:2 weft-faced compound 
twill.  That is, the modern writers are using it as a technical term 
for this specific weave types.  I don't know whether it might have 
had a different or more general meaning in the 12th century.


Heather
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