_Bands_ (Vol. ii., p. 23.) are the descendants of the ruff a portion of the
ordinary civil costume of the sixteenth century. In the reign of James I.,
the ruff was occasionally exchanged for a wide stiff collar, standing out
horizontally and squarely, made of similar stuff, starched and wired, and
sometimes edged like the ruff with lace. These collars were called bands. A
good example occurs in the portrait of Shakspeare by Cornelius Jansen,
engravings of which are well known. At the end of the seventeenth century
these broad-falling bands were succeeded by the small Geneva bands, which
have ever since been retained by our clergymen and councillors, but in a
contracted form, having been originally _bonâ fide_ collars, the ends of
which hung negligently over the shoulders. (See Planché's _Brit. Costume_,
pp. 350. 390.) Bands are worn by the ecclesiastics in France and Italy, as
well as in England.
In the second number of _Popular Tracts Illustrating the Prayer-Book_, p.
3., it is suggested that bands are perhaps the remains of the amice, one of
the eucharistic vestments in use previous to the Reformation, which
consisted of a square cloth, so put on that one side, which was
embroidered, formed a collar round the neck, whilst the rest hung behind
like a hood. By analogy with the scarf of our Protestant clergy, which is
clearly the stole of the Roman Church retained under a different name, this
suggestion is not without some degree of plausibility.
The fact that the present academical costume is derived from the ordinary
civil dress of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, sufficiently
accounts for the retention of the bands as a part.