Costume: Fanciful, Historical and TheatricalAria, Mrs. (Eliza Davis)
History
Costume: Fanciful, Historical and Theatrical
Aria, Mrs. (Eliza Davis)
Costume -- History
In Switzerland black is allowed on festival garb, and on Sundays the
women wear black in the mornings and change to colours in the evening. In
the Berne Canton the women usually display a black lace cap, shaped like
a fan and tied under the chin, accompanying this with long green gloves;
and in everyday life their costume comprises a blue or black petticoat
reaching to the ankles, scolloped at the border with red or white,
completed with a white chemisette high to the throat, with full short
sleeves revealed beneath a short sleeveless jacket. On their heads are
straw hats, and on their legs and feet red stockings with black clocks
and heel-less shoes, and their hair is worn hanging down in two long
plaits.
Costume has through the ages been allowed to signify the married or
unmarried state of its wearer. In Rome the purple-bordered toga and the
segmentum--concerning which there has been some discussion, since it has
been separately described as a necklace, a fringe, and an embroidered
ribbon--would grace the matron. The Roman bride wore a red veil or flamen
on her wedding-day; and in Greece the married woman parted her hair in
front in a different fashion from that of the maids; and to this day in
some parts of the Grecian Islands brides wear the flame-coloured veil,
and follow the custom of putting a patch of gold-leaf on the face. The
modern bride of Corfu illustrated at page 126 is wearing a skirt of
purple and an apron of blue, and a short blue corselet buckled with gold;
her small red velvet coat is traced with gold, and gold ornaments hang
round her neck and hold the white chemisette across the bust. Ribbons
entwine her hair with garlands of flowers, and over these a soft white
veil hangs to the waist, ribbons again fluttering their elegance from
waist to hem.
In various parts of Italy the peasants have ornaments handed down from
generation to generation, and as a present to each succeeding bride an
extra chain or jewel is added, forming a sentimental record of lineage
which only the most devastating poverty induces the possessor to part
with.
The practice of weaving a wedding-veil is an old one, dating from the
times of ancient Greece. A bride of Attica is immortalised in a long
flowing robe of clinging rose colour, with a girdle of gold cord knotted
and tasselled. Her hair is closely curled round the nape of her neck,
and drawn up at the back into a wide meshed net, the front banded with
a golden fillet engraved with a Grecian key pattern, whence floats a
transparent white veil to the ground.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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