IN THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY
The Tudor period brought an extraordinary revolution in dress, the first
important change taking place in the sleeves, which were now of different
material and different colour from the gown. Several pairs of sleeves
would be allotted to each gown, and were necessarily made detachable,
while in shape they were full and puffed, padded and quilted and slashed
and fitting tightly; and the square-necked, short-waisted style of dress
was punctilious in a display of a stomacher and a full train.
Cloth of gold was the favourite fabric, being used alike for decoration
as for garments, and indeed gold asserted itself on every rich material,
and there was a silver taffeta embroidered in gold; and a damask of
crimson or yellow wrought with gold offered itself persuasively for fur
trimming, lynx and sable and marten accepting the responsibility with
zeal.
The fair footed it bravely in low shoes adorned with large ribbon
Tudor roses, which were also allotted the delicate duty of ornamenting
elaborate garters. The plainer variety of shoe was of wood covered with
velvet or leather, stitched with silk and fastened with buckles or
rosettes; and a wooden shoe in vogue was known as the pantoffle, and
not unlike that chopine worn in Italy at this time and later, when it
attained the pinnacle of the preposterous. This shoe was, however, known
in England only in a modified form.
None of the fashions of the day could truthfully be called comfortable.
Comfort obviously was banished from consideration, and each innovation
during the sixteenth century shows its demands more and more disregarded.
The hoop appeared, and held the best affections in its grasp of iron,
wood, or whalebone, the indispensable edicts against it following quickly
upon its popularity. Rich and poor alike fell victims to its aggressive
charms, and alike insisted upon its wear, and, on the occasion of her
marriage with Prince Arthur of Wales, Catherine of Medici wore the dress
of Spain and a mantilla bordered with gold and precious stones, and her
skirt was distended by several hoops.
The wives of that merry polygamist Henry VIII. were sympathetically
attached to beautiful clothes, and Anne Boleyn is credited with wearing
a cap of blue velvet trimmed with golden bells, and a vest of velvet
starred with silver, and over it a surcoat of watered silk lined with
miniver, with large pendent sleeves; blue velvet brodequins were on her
feet, with a diamond star on each instep, and above her long curls was
placed an aureole of plaited gold. It is a well-known fact that Anne,
because of some slight deformity of the hand, held affectionately to the
charms of the hanging sleeve after it had been discarded in favour of the
full puffed and slashed sleeve. There is an attractive picture of her
by Holbein, with the hair drawn from her forehead in small curls, and a
plait hanging from the top of the head over one ear, the crown being worn
rather far back and kept in place by a jewelled caul.
To Spain historians have granted the laurel of the ruff, which became
first popular in England in the reign of Henry VIII.; and Anne Boleyn
introduced lappets made of velvet and adorned with precious stones,
either pointed at the hem or square and broad.
During those days the length of the gown denoted the rank of the wearer,
countesses and baronesses and ladies of lower degree stamping their
estate upon the dimensions of their train. Embroidery decorated the
gowns and petticoats alike, many of the dresses being cut open in front
to display a satin kirtle and an apron embroidered in gold and many
colours. The bodice of the dress sometimes differed in colour from the
skirt, and the sleeves would match the skirt; and there was much variety
in head-dress, the velvet cap tasselled and set with jewels above a
floating veil being a popular style. But cauls, coifs, and French hoods,
and the high bands in front, were in evidence, together with a white
three-cornered cap, the original no doubt of the Marie Stuart cap of
succeeding years.
The men were as prodigal as the women, and spared no expense or time
or thought in their pursuit of the sumptuous and the elegant; their
shoes and garters and hats glittered with gems, and they wore rings and
chains in profusion, raising the trades of tailors and goldsmiths and
cloth-makers to supreme importance. Jack of Newbury, a famous cloth
merchant of the time of Henry VIII., is described as appearing before
that monarch in a plain russet coat and a pair of white kersey slops,
the stockings of the same piece being sewn to his slops. Slops was a
term developed from "slip," and signified any garment easily adjusted,
and an example of its use occurs in _Much Ado About Nothing_, a phrase
running "as, a German from the waist downward, all slops"; hence may the
suspicious glean that the Teuton habit of costume was not mainly trim.
[Illustration: IN THE TIME OF HENRY VII.]
Men yielded to the general craze for an expanded hip, wearing great
breeches stuffed with hair or bran or wool, and exhibiting no less
than feminine enthusiasm in the width of their ruffles. Their hose, of
different detail, was either of cloth or silk, and blazed with colour,
being ornamented with gold or threads of Venetian silver, though the King
himself preferred cloth hose, which also had the honour of decorating
Queen Elizabeth, until she chanced to meet with the silk stocking, to
which she thereafter clung with tenacity.
Jane Seymour's coronation dress was of her faithless spouse's favourite
material, cloth of gold; all his wives seem to have been obliging enough
to yield to his fancy for this extravagance, and this poor lady's choice
was decorated with a raised design of embroidery and pearls, and the
stomacher beneath was thickly encrusted with jewels, while her surcoat
was of purple velvet bordered with ermine and embroidered with gold, and
a jewelled velvet caul was on her head. Anne of Cleves endeavoured to
popularise the Dutch fashion of a gown without a train, and she was as
much a failure in this as in her other ambitions. Catharine Parr, the
last of the noble six, had a gown of cloth of gold made with a sleeve
quite tight at the shoulder, bordered at the elbow with fur, and showing
beneath a slashed and puffed under-sleeve, finished by a small ruffle at
the wrist.
Mary inherited her father's love of splendour and costly apparel, and her
favourite head-dress was of cloth of gold, and her gowns were generally
of velvet trimmed with fur and jewelled. Elizabeth devoted herself to
fashion in a frank, whole-hearted way that brooked no half-measures,
and amongst her terrors of death must have been parting with her gowns,
for she died possessed of no fewer than three thousand dresses. What a
harvest for the ladies-in-waiting or the dealers of the day to gather!
Her crimson locks she piled high up in curls and puffs, surmounted by
crowns of jewels, and her sleeves and hooped skirts were padded into
diamond design traced with embroidery, and every point would hold a
pendent jewel. She showed no desire to achieve grace or elegance below
the waist; nothing more entirely unbecoming to the feminine figure can be
imagined than the tight, hard, flat, narrow bodice terminating in a point
at the front, cut off at the waist on the hips, above the monstrously
distended petticoat. The over-part of the dress and the skirt beneath
it were boned and wired, and tight lacing ruled in an injurious degree,
though the enormous sleeves, ruffles, and skirts might well have accorded
such an effect of slimness as to render stringent measures unnecessary.
Dress was a magnificent affair altogether; velvet and taffeta and fine
scarlet cloth were used, lace played its part bravely, and silken scarves
fringed with gold and silver were thrown over the shoulders, with deep
capes of satin or velvet edged with lace. Every shape and length of
garment obtained, and the only extravagance from which dress did not
suffer was in the _décolletage_, which was narrow and straight and of
dimensions eminently decent.
[Illustration: A TRIO OF RUFFS.]
[Illustration: QUEEN ELIZABETH IN FULL DRESS.]
Elizabeth introduced the whalebone corset, and hers might well have
been called the "wire and whalebone age," for the influence of these
was needed for the petticoats, the gowns and stays, and it had a
considerable share in the good conduct of the ruffles which extended
some nine inches from the neck. In France the ruffles were so enormous
that they hardly allowed their wearers to turn their heads at all, and
courtiers who affected them were provided with long-handled spoons to
enable them to take their soup in comfort. These huge ruffs were trimmed
with lace outlined with wire threads to ensure sufficient stiffness,
a demand creating the supply of starch, which made its appearance in
this century, being introduced by the wife of Elizabeth's coachman, who
established herself as Lady High Laundress of the Court, and made at once
a competence and a reputation. Ruffs were of yellow as well as white,
and yellow too were some of the extensive lace collars jewelled and
embroidered in gold, which with wired edges outlined the shoulders of all
dresses worn on state occasions.
Pins and ribbons were first brought into use in the reign of Elizabeth,
and really to her interest in the subject of fashion we owe much. Silk
stockings amongst other things, such as cosmetics, face washes and
perfumes, and embroidered and scented gloves, and fans made of ostrich or
peacock feathers with gold and silver handles, were adopted by the men as
well as by the women.
Of the many head-dresses favoured by Elizabeth one resembled a cushion,
ornamented with jewels; another, known as a ship-tire, left the neck and
shoulders bare; and another, dubbed the tire valiant, was made of many
kerchiefs, so disposed as to allow only the nose, eyes, and mouth to be
visible.
In the early days of the sixteenth century dress in France was somewhat
simple, but about 1550 tastes altered and every kind of trimming was
eagerly sought and found, and the lappets, which became a popular
addition to the head-dress, displayed jewelled borders or golden tassels
in the shape of a flower. The hair fell in curls about the face and on
the neck, and in a long description which we have from Rabelais, of a
dress of the period in Paris, there is mention of a beautiful bouquet of
feathers, a panache, which matched the muff, and was thickly spangled
with gold. To him also we owe an excellent account of crimson stockings
with the edges embroidered three inches above the knee, and of garters
of elaborate detail to hold these, and of shoes and slippers of crimson
or violet velvet to complete them. Attire consisted of a chemise worn
beneath a corset of silk camlet, a hood of silk, and above this a
_cotte_ in silver tissue embroidered in gold. In summer the Parisian
wore, instead of a dress, wraps made in a loose burnous style of velvet
seamed with pearls, and no costume was complete without its rosary, its
girdle, jewelled necklaces and bracelets. The most popular head-dress
was a velvet hood with a hanging curtain, and the turban wound its
graceful way above a network of pearls or precious stones. Muffs received
much attention and elaboration, fur and lace and jewels alike being
dedicated to their service, and in their depths would nestle the dog or
monkey or marmoset whose mistress counted such a pet in her armoury of
attractions. A description of a _robe montante_, which appears to have
been comparatively a _négligé_, not permitted the honour of attending
Court functions, shows it cut square in the neck, with a collar of fine
cambric finished with a small ruff, the sleeves, puffed and slashed and
fitting tightly to the wrists, being of a different material from the
dress; and in France, as in England, rank determined the length of the
train, queens burdening themselves with no less than six yards.
[Illustration: A CHEMISETTE.]
[Illustration: AN ITALIAN LADY.]
In the early days of this century turban head-dresses were popular in
Italy, and slashed and puffed sleeves were trimmed with ribbon. It is
interesting to note that the women of Genoa were bound by law to wear a
dress of plain cloth, but that their under-garments were of the richest
silks, and shoes and hose were costly details. The sketch on page 59
shows an Italian lady under attractive conditions, with a stomacher and
collar traced with a raised design of gold outlined with pearls, and
puffed sleeves tied with ribbons tagged with metal; and, covering her
hair, is a close coif edged with pearls. Italian also are the two heads
illustrated, lace and jewels and ribbons being used for their adornment.
The Italian gentleman wears a full-crowned cap of velvet, and a cloth
coat showing slashings and collar of velvet, the lawn frill inside the
collar being repeated at the wrists of the sleeves, whose detail of
slashing may well be left to the imagination.
[Illustration: TWO ITALIAN COIFFURES.]
[Illustration: AN ITALIAN GENTLEMAN.]
Spain was faithful to the horned head-dress late into the sixteenth
century; and talking of Spain, I am reminded of that illustration
opposite, where a sixteenth-century Spaniard is exploiting an unusual
form of trunk, in cut-out cloth, showing white beneath, and buttoned with
straps on to the hose. His white shirt is slashed, and from the double
collar falls a tassel; tassels are pendent from the drapery of the long
gold-bordered cloak, and a gold net appears beneath the characteristic
cap of velvet.
[Illustration: A SPANIARD IN THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.]
[Illustration: A SHOULDER-JACKET.]
The picture on page 64 of Maximilian of fame shows him brave in
upstanding felt hat, encircled with flaunting feathers, and beneath this
a striped scarf is bound round his head, and the monstrous sleeves have
slashings of colour. Tassels dangle from the scarf beneath the chin and
over either ear, and bold bows assert themselves above one knee, and
claim their right to hold the folds of his sash in front.
A sixteenth-century sacque coat in its original sin--or grace--appears
illustrated on the left, with sleeves slashed and the armholes bearing
padded rolls on the top. The inner vest has a high collar boned to stand
out at the back, and the helmet-shaped hat is trimmed with bands of
braid buttoned with gold, with two feathers waving at one side.
[Illustration: THE CAPE WITH BUTTONED SLEEVE.]
Another edition of the helmet-shaped hat, far less successful, however,
in the interests of beauty, decorates the right-hand figure, which bears
round the neck a wonderful ruff, and gives a capital idea of a strange
form of cape buttoned down the sleeve, gathered slightly in the process,
and bordered with a band of plain colour.
[Illustration: MAXIMILIAN.]
Fair and sweet looks the maiden on page 58 beneath the kilted frill of
her cap, and her little bodice shows her chemisette of white lawn tied
in front with small bows.
"I will ruffle it with the best of them" was distinctly the determination
of the valiant queen who smiles upon you on page 56. Lace forms her huge
collar and her pendent lappets, and tightly round her throat sits a lace
ruffle; an audacious feather stands rampant on top of her crown, and
beneath this is a cap bordered with jewels, curved at one side to allow a
good view of her curled head, where the flat cap of jewels holds a golden
pendant in the centre of her forehead.
Far more demure are the ruffle and cap which appear on page 55 beneath
the closely-hooded mantle, and severity marks the net and lace of the
dame whose hair is entwined with pearls; and a typical Medici collar of
lace is elaborately wired to form a frame to the fair head, upon which
jewels and feathers alike disport themselves.
In this century fashion was playing the woman who often varies, and
La Bruyère in reviewing the situation says: "A fashion has no sooner
supplanted some other fashion than its place is taken by a new one,
which in turn makes way for the next, and so on; such is the feebleness
of our character. While these changes are taking place a century has
rolled away, relegating all this finery to the dominion of the past." And
writing in the twentieth century, I can see some satisfaction in that.