From: owner-h-costume-digest (H-Costume Digest) To: h-costume-digest@lunch.engr.sgi.com Subject: H-Costume Digest V3 #197 Reply-To: h-costume Errors-To: owner-h-costume-digest@lunch.engr.sgi.com Precedence: bulk H-Costume Digest Friday, September 22 1995 Volume 3, Number 197 Compilation copyright (C) 1995 Diane Barlow Close and Gretchen Miller Use in whole prohibited. Individual articles are the property of the author. Seek permission from that author before reprinting or quoting elsewhere. Important Addresses: Send submissions to: h-costume@lunch.engr.sgi.com (or reply to this message). Adds/drops/archives: majordomo@lunch.engr.sgi.com Real, live person: h-costume-request@andrew.cmu.edu Topics: RE: Authenticity Bathing Suit Book The only way I can... ermine & tudor boning an elizabethan corset Re: Authenticity RE: Authenticity Re: ermine RE: Authenticity Civil War Officer's Overcoat Pattern? Re: Authenticity Comments and a Report ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Thu, 21 Sep 95 17:06:11 TZ From: Edward Wright Subject: RE: Authenticity | Wasn't Elizabeth I known to have a rather cutting tongue, too? I know if I | were back then, I would have been totally embarrassed if the | Queen called me on the carpet for being sloppy. The opposite could be equally bad. There's one recorded occasion on which Elizabeth boxed the ears of a lady for dressing better than the Queen did. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 21 Sep 1995 20:20:25 -0700 From: Allan Terry Subject: Bathing Suit Book Someone bought the book on Victorian bathing suits I advertised, but several other people expressed interest. So I'm posting information on how to get it from the publisher. The publisher is: Fabric Fancies PO Box 50807 Reno, NV 89513 (702) 746-0666 They have published _Victorian Bathing Costumes_ and _Victorian Millinery: Ladies' Hats 1850-1900_, and have a forthcoming book, _Victorian Bicycling Costumes_. All are edited by Paula Darnell, also the publisher. These books are anthologies of period fashion illustrations and descriptions, with very little additional material. I'm all in favor of reprinting older stuff. But I think the price of these books--$20 or so plus shipping--is excessive for slim, photocopied, plastic-comb-bound editions. Also, I first saw all three books advertised a couple years ago. I paid for the lot. When I didn't receive them, I wrote increasingly heated letters for many months before I got my money back. (I didn't have a phone number for Fabric Fancies then.) One of those books, _Bicyling Costumes_ is currently advertised in the catalog as forthcoming in August, and this is crossed out and "January" written in. So if you do buy a book from this publisher, I'd recommend first verifying that it's actually been published. Fabric Fancies also sells some Dover Books and Bridal Elegance patterns. Fran Grimble ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 21 Sep 1995 12:42:45 -0400 From: SyRilla@aol.com Subject: The only way I can... Just a small note to add to the war. I am one of the cheap, lazy people. ( I know the writer never meant this to lable anyone) At the moment that is all that I can afford to be. I am a full time student with a partime job, that can only afford to buy large amount of material or cutains from the thrift stores or if a have a birthday (only once a year, booooo) and the local fabric stores have a half off sale. I have bought a few Past patterns for the Medeival and Elizibeathean costumes and use them when I can. I am not an acomplised seamstress ( that's why I'm going to school), so I can not just make up patterns. I do use the librarys extensively, they know me by name and tell me wich books are out or in. I do make my own designed costumes for other people and myself for our local Renn. faire. Even though they are not authetic, except in the basic design everyone still loves them and enjoys wearing them. I do try. I envy the people that have the resources to make "authentic" or even look alike costumes. I truly wish I could. I will some day!!!! However I do want to work in the theatrical costume, historically if possible, so thats an even diffrent type of Authentisity. Please no more wars, the white flag is out !!!! ____________ I I I I I I - --------------------- I I I I My 2 cents ! Kimberly D. Stockton SyRilla@aol.com "Who said that I dress funny?" P.S. I do enjoy this list. ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 22 Sep 1995 04:10:03 -0400 From: kl94ag@badger.ac.BrockU.CA (Kathleen Leggat) Subject: ermine & tudor Thanks for all the information on ermines. My little guys are very soft, but they fit the physical description, so even if they are not real, they will certainly look real. (And that's a level I can be happy with, right now) Can anyone help with my Tudor undertaking? I have one more question: I plan to machine quilt the underskirt and sleeves (and partlet). Is there anything I should be aware of? Any potential difficulties? To make sure my lines are straight, I plan to pencil in ruled lines on the lining fabric, then sew along them. Thanks. Kathleen (Catriona) (P.S.--I told my boyfriend and my roommate about my undertaking...they're trying to figure out where to hide for the next week or so!) ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 22 Sep 1995 01:10:32 +48000 From: Trudy Subject: boning an elizabethan corset hello there...i'm planning on making my first elizabethan corset, and i'm trying to figure out how exactly to bone it. i've heard conflicting ideas on how exactly to make the front support me correctly. some people have told me that a fan front boning pattern will support me better; others have said that this does absolutely nothing, and to just make the bones all go straight up and down. and OTHERS have told me that for better support, i should get a large piece of plastic and cut it into a triangle to fit the front of the corset (???). what do people recommend? also, can i wash steel boning, or will something tragic happen? thanks! ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 22 Sep 1995 04:10:13 -0400 From: kl94ag@badger.ac.BrockU.CA (Kathleen Leggat) Subject: Re: Authenticity Edward Wright wrote: >Also, not all modern trends work in the direction of keeping a youthful >appearance. The modern ideal may be to look "fit and tan," but skin >tanning is, in fact, the number one cause of premature wrinkling and >aging of the skin (not to mention skin cancer). In many periods, >however, fair skin was the ideal, and no one spent an excessive amount >of time in the sun if he could afford not to. (Granted, the number of >people who could afford not to was rather small, agricultural labor >being the number one occupation up until very recent times.) >Similarly, I have known men and women in their thirties who already >have arthritis from modern sports such as weighlifting. > Speaking of sun protection...(here she goes again!)...Elizabethan women wore full face black velvet masks, held in place by a button held between the teeth. (For once I can quote my source! Accessories of Dress, by Lester and Morris...great book...unfortunately out of print. Anyone know where I can find a copy?) My question is...doesn't this seem like a ridiculous way to hold the mask on? How could you talk? Any thoughts or different research? Kathleen (Catriona) ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 22 Sep 1995 04:10:06 -0400 From: kl94ag@badger.ac.BrockU.CA (Kathleen Leggat) Subject: RE: Authenticity Sarah E. Goodman wrote: >But first, she would have done her damnedest to clean it, change the >over-skirt, hide things with embroidery, etc. People just did not go in >for owning the kind of wardrobes we do now, at any level of society. >Clothing was too bloody expensive! I read somewhere that the fashion for slashes and pinking came out of necessity due to sword nicks in a man's clothing. (And, as usual in the 16th century, went way out of proportion...) >And while Elizabeth I would probably have something to say about a >slutty (as in neat, not as in moral) lady in her court, she also came >down pretty hard on people who out-did her, clothing wise, so one would >never wish to have more gowns than the queen. I think it would have been difficult to own more gowns than Elizabeth, but it _was_ a bad move to wear a _nicer_ gown than Gloriana. Speaking of Elizabeth...(she's back on the authenticity kick again!)...even the Queen used fake pearls on her gowns. I think that's from The Queen's Wardrobe Unlock'd. So...if faking it is period, then my faking it is in an Elizabethan vein and therefore authentic... (I told you I was good at justifying!) Kathleen (Catriona) ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 22 Sep 1995 08:28:55 -0400 (EDT) From: Staff - Michigan Health Promotion Clearinghouse Subject: Re: ermine > still like to know. Ermine is a winter coat for an animal...which one? > Mink? Weasel? Stoat? > The Ermine. But they're all versions of weasels, it's just semantics. Stoat's genus/species is Mustela erminea Mink's is Mustela vison. Ermine is any weasel whose coat turns from summer brown to white in the winter, with a black tipped tail, usually. ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 22 Sep 1995 08:50:24 -0500 (CDT) From: Teresa Shannon Subject: RE: Authenticity > This reminded me of a great scene from the book "Tyrant Lo > Blanc", which was written in the 1300's, and partially by a knight. > Tyrant and the wimpy Dauphin of France are following the > Dauphin's betrothed, the Princess of Sicily, on cantering horses. > > PS: "Tyrant Lo Blanc" is on my highly recommended for reading > list. Excellent discriptions of Knighting, UnKnighting, Tourneys, > battles, lots of action, but unfortunately, marginal costume > descriptions at best. > --julie adams > That would be the Tirant Lo Blanc written in the 1460s and translated into english in the 1490s or 1500s written by the Catalan knight? It is not even vaguely 14th century, and I agree it is delightful to read, at least the first part, it really starts to drag later on. Good description of very late medieval costume if you look for it, the stockings of the Infanta Empress that Tirant falls in love with (but can never attain because of his rank) are wonderful. And I would recommend not to take the descriptions of knighting and unknighting seriously, if you want romantic elements in you knighting ceremony read Caxton's translation of Ramon Lull. However if you want a literary knighting example from the late fifteenth century, I agree with Julie, Tirant has a good example for it. Of course so does Olivietta, Morte d'Arthur [sp], Wigalois, Parzival, Christin de Pisan's treatise on arms and armour etc. But back to the discussion. I jealously guard notions of fourteenth-century literature and especially chivalry studies, which I do more than costume/sumptuary research, especially lately. Forgive any heavy handedness, the book is worth reading and so are Julies comments, but it is a late fifteenth century catalan book, in fact it was one of the last "romances" ever written along with Amadis of Gaul, Olivietta, the Mirror of Chivalry and a few others (Orlando Furioso doesn't really fit the romance part). Teresa ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 22 Sep 95 10:02:51 -0500 From: ejp@watson.ibm.com Subject: Civil War Officer's Overcoat Pattern? Well, alright, and a partial delurk. I barge in if a question comes up where I think my own contribution is unlikely to be made by others, but most of the questions are very likely to be answered just as well by somebody else who *doesn't* have an annoying case of RSI. Some people pick their battles, I pick my keystrokes. :) Now I need your assistance. I'd like to make a garment-quality topcoat for my one and only, and he's very interested in the styling of Civil War officer's coats. We looked over an old Campbell's catalog, and found some awful little drawings of what may, in fact, be very nice coat and overcoat patterns in the Period Impressions section. One was labeled "Officer's Frock Coat", another was clearly a caped topcoat described as "Perfect for those winter campaigns". This caped CW coat might be just the ticket. Then again, suppose the quality of the pattern is comparable to the quality of the drawing? Many of you are far better informed in this area than I am. Would I be happy with this Period Impressions pattern, or is there something far better that I just don't know about yet? What makes me happy: I sew with Vogue or else draft my own patterns. Lines and details are *important* to me. I've costumed _Amadeus_ and _Nicholas Nickleby_. A well-drafted pattern is worth the $20 dollars, because my time is worth more. My sweetie is a fairly normal size 40, with slightly broader shoulders and longer arms. (Not a fitting problem.) I suspect I won't need to be minutely authentic (modern buttons will probably do), so long as I get those lovely lines. Can you help? What did I leave out? :) What do you think I need? thanks, ejp - -------- Elizabeth Poole ejp@watson.ibm.com ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 22 Sep 1995 09:32:46 -0500 (CDT) From: Teresa Shannon Subject: Re: Authenticity > Okay so the Aristocrats and Royalty (depending upon the time period) > would look better and dress better, however I have to disagree with > the thought that they would just buy an new garment or put a new one > on. Speaking from the point of view of a lace maker/merchant of the > time, no person in their right mind would take clothing that non > chalantly. There were nobles who sold large portions of their estate > for lace yardage that was required to be worn if they were to show > their status in society. You didn't just throw that away and buy new. > So I believe, and I would have trouble documenting this, that a > garment and the lace on it would be worn until it was just not > possible to wear. Here I would like to interject and say this is definitely a time period problem. The time period setting from Julie's quote from Tirant lo Blanc is a valid one for fifteenth century nobleman. At this time the noble still held a large amount of the wealth of the country. Silk was by this time quite a normal commodity, there was no lace equaling status and the romance etiquette needed to be followed. The Dauphin could certainly afford a new outfit everyday, the fact that he whined about his clothing is an indicator of his pettiness, effiminate nature, and is used to indicate how he was acting Not at a noble and certainly not as a dauphin, but as some low-born who does have to worry about appearance. Tirant was requested to follow the Dauphin and teach him manly and chivalric ways of behavior so he could get the girl to marry him. The book sets it up so the Dauphin is obviously not worthy of the title, the girl, or Tirant's company. By the time of the 1500s war and the plague had taken out most of the working population. Those that were left went to the city or worked for wages. Nobility became very cash poor, there rents couldn't provide much income or material goods, and they had to pay cash for everything. Much silver and gold plate was converted for cash and the nobility started the decline primarily from lack of capital and money. As the towns had been granted financial independence centuries ago, they lobbied for extra polictical gains and were given them since all the crowns needed money and the towns were the only ones giving taxes. The nobility didn't pay tax. Anyway the towns economic independence and political leverage shiften the cash of the country mostly to middle class hands (not wealth, but cash) and since cash was what was needed by the time to get anything in the 1500s and 1600s, that left the nobility is very poor condition. So a fifty year to seventy five year period is the difference between "gentlemen would just get new clothing" and gentlemen would scramble for their clothing. The times really do make the difference. I do have some general history references for economics but I'd rather not go and find them. So just take what I've said as opinion-educated slightly. Teresa ------------------------------ Date: 22 Sep 95 11:29:00 BST From: Mrs C S Yeldham Subject: Comments and a Report First, my modest (!) comments on current postings! Teeth - the state of your teeth, even today with modern dentistry (I speak as a dentists daughter!) is mainly dependent on the level of sugar in the diet, with the amount of roughage in the diet as the second factor (genetics is also important, but debateable). Archaeological findings have shown that medieval people had very good teeth, strong and with a low level of caries. Their diet was very low in sugar and much of the diet was full of roughage, lots of unbolted flour and vegetables! (I am now largely talking about England). Sugar up to the end of the 16th century was treated like a spice, bought in similar quantities, and very expensive. We start getting refineries in this country towards the end of the century (1570's,and a little earlier in Antwerp) but it was still expensive, so only the nobles could afford to indulge (the common quote about Elizabeth with black teeth - she could afford the sugar!). Molasses, a major by-product, was known as medicinal treacle, also expensive even then and used, as the name implys, by apothecaries. Some dentists also believe that generations of refined food (eg white flour) and high sugar in the diet is leading to people losing their teeth, not exercising their jaws, hence smaller jaws and more orthodontic problems. So, you could argue that our teeth and jaws are not good enough to represent medieval people, but, with the results of modern dentistry, too good for the 18th and 19th centuries! How many Gowns? I think there is a tendancy to underestimate how solidly 16th century clothes were made (my area, comments welcome on other areas). These things last, even working clothes. I've got skirts and bodices I've worn for 5 or 6 years, some of the time working in a kitchen, the rest as just for mucking around in, and they are worn, but still fine. If I was working in a kitchen, I would get a length of (wool) cloth each year as part of my wages, sufficient to make at least one garment (standard employment practice). So people would end up with several garments in various states of wear. If this was true of working people, wasn't it true of gentry? The complaints I've seen about gentry with too few clothes, eg from the Lisle Letters, where the daughters living with friends as attendants complain they have nothing to wear, relate to children who have *outgrown* their clothes. Another piece of evidence on this is that clothes, usually mens from memory, were specified in wills as part of the inheritance, and then presumably altered to fit the inheritor. There was also an active secondhand market in clothes in Elizabethan London - which I believe is where the actors often bought their clothes. Marriage Average age in England through medieval and early modern England was 25 for women and 27 for men. Even where people were married younger (eg aristocracy) it does not imply a full marriage. They might be brought up by their respective families or by the grooms family but would be kept apart. They were well aware of the dangers of a girl having a baby too soon, and had a different attitude to romantic love to our own. I often wonder whether the first audience of 'Romeo and Juliet' saw it as 'romantic', I am sure they would not approve of a 13 year old girl getting married without her parents approval. Juliet's mother is the age they would expect a woman to get married at! Report Some of you may remember I mentioned I would be attending an exhibition of Queen Elizabeth I's underclothes. Well, that was last night, in St Margaret's Church, which is between Westminster Abbey and the Houses of Parliament. Westminster Abbey is having a major overhaul, including the effigies which, from 1377 to the end of the Stuarts, were carried in funeral processions to represent the deceased monarch and then displayed in Westminster Abbey (where most of them were buried). It does not include all of them, and some have been subsequently lost. There are also a few later ones, like Nelson and Pitt, which were more used as tourist attractions by the Abbey. There were two talks, one by Sheila Landry, the conservator, and *Janet Arnold*!!! What follows is a digest only! It was thought Elizabeth's effigy had been replaced in 1760, and the outer garments and most of the supporting garments do date from then. These are not good quality and the conservator thinks they may have been theatrical costumes, probably replacing her Parliamentary robes, or robes of estate. BTW the fake pearls were apparently made with gelative beads, a layer of nacre inside the gelative and then wax inside that. However, when they took the outer garments off, what remains is a newly recognised Elizabethan pair of bodies and a pair of drawers - which have been used to shape the effigy under the clothes to Elizabeth's shapes. They would originally have been stuffed with cotton wool (JA) but are now stuffed with 18th century hay. The effigy, with others, was 'conserved' by the V&A in the 1930s and the corset was photographed then, but not recognised. BTW no scientific dating has been done - it will probably be done shortly - but if JA says its 16th century ...! The pair of bodies and pair of drawers were supplied by the Queen's tailor (accounts) and JA thinks they were probably ready cut items which had not been made up (certainly the corset). They are made of fustian (cotton and linen) and not particularly soft from the look. She suggests the tailor would have some cut ready for the next order but when this order cam through they did not bother to put the usual silk covering on the corset (Wardrobe accounts refer to 'silk' corsets - the covering). The corset is 'straight bodies' and probably petticoat bodies - there are lacing holes at the top of the tabs to which the petticoat or farthingale could be attached. It is 1603 in style, ie long at the front, down to about the top of the legs. It is front lacing with 29 holes on each side. The stiffening is whalebone, quarter inch wide except for the centre front one one each side, which is half inch wide. This centre one runs up the front to about waist level and then bows gently out, and three quarter-inch bones are graduated in. The edge of the corset is covered in soft leather, like chamois and it was apparently apple-green originally. It has quite large shoulder pieces, which are tied to the top of the corset with leather, and also have lacing holes at the top of the shoulder (part of the assembly of the effigy?). Dimensions - 24 inch waist and 31 or 32 inch bust (don't forget, quite a lot of the bust would sit 'on top' of the corset - cleavage time! It doesn't look as though Liz I was very tightly corseted, more as if she was built quite lightly in the bones - but that is difficult to tell from an effigy. JA is making a copy of the corset, including whalebone from Copenhagen! The drawers are also fustian and have been padded to make hip shapes over the wooden frame, so it is difficult to see how they would have been worn originally. They would seem to fit to the waist under the corset gathered to a waistband, with a centrefront gap down to the crotch, but seamed up the back. They would be quite close fitting, down to the knees. Seams up the centre front of the leg to the waistband and to the crotch (not sure about the back). JA suggests they were utilitarian garments used for riding (cross or side saddle), not for normal wear. There are lacing holes on the waistband of the drawers, which JA suggests were put in when the effigy was made to hold the padded drawers to the corset. The effigys are being conserved gradually, and are on display in the Undercroft Museum of Westminster Abbey. The original effigy of Elizabeth will remain in the current exhibition at St Margarets for a while, until the scientific examinations have been sorted out and then moved to Westminster. So, if any of you are visiting the UK ... A scolarly book, with contributions from JA, has been published on the effigies, but unfortunately not based on this work (too recent), but it does have the picture of the corset laid out flat, and lovely pictures of the other effigies (Charles II is particularly fine). If you would like details, let me know. BTW JA said her book on smocks and shirts should not be long now, she has the details of the final (1640s) shirt she wanted and Macmillan will be publishing it. On the other hand, I've heard that for the last few years! I think this is quite long enough, so if you have any queries, let me know. I'm happy to try and answer them! Caroline ------------------------------ End of H-Costume Digest V3 #197 ******************************* A non-digest (direct mail) version of this list is also available; to subscribe to that instead, send the command lines: unsubscribe h-costume-digest subscribe h-costume end in the body of a message to majordomo@lunch.engr.sgi.com. Thanks and enjoy the list!