Greek dress : $b a study of the costumes worn in ancient Greece, from pre-Hellenic times to the Hellenistic ageAbrahams, Ethel Beatrice
History
Greek dress : $b a study of the costumes worn in ancient Greece, from pre-Hellenic times to the Hellenistic age
Abrahams, Ethel Beatrice
Clothing and dress -- Greece
being drawn up anywhere.[115] It is obvious, then, that the artist
intended to indicate that the wearer had drawn the dress up through
the girdle, so as not to impede progress. Anyone who has ever moved
about freely wearing a chiton of this kind, will know that unless the
girdle is uncomfortably tight the dress has a habit of slipping down,
so that it is necessary to pull it up sometimes, so as to prevent
treading on it in front.
[112] Fig. 27.
[113] Fig. 16.
[114] _Quæstiones vestiariæ._
[115] Fig. 28.
[Illustration: FIG. 27.—The Delphi Charioteer.
_Face page_ 62.]
[Illustration: FIG. 28.—Vase-painting—Munich.
Furtwängler and Reichhold, _Griechische Vasenmalerei_, 33.
_Face page_ 63.]
A feature of the Ionic chiton not very easy to understand is the
overfold, which occurs very frequently, especially in vase-paintings
of the severe red-figured class; it is not a normal feature of
the Ionic chiton, and may very possibly have been added by the
Athenian women when they adopted the dress, since they had always
been accustomed to wearing it with the Doric peplos. The view that
Herodotus (v., 87) is wrong, and that the Athenian women never
wore the Doric dress at all, is hardly tenable in the face of such
evidence as the François vase and others like it, which are certainly
of Attic workmanship.
The Ionic chiton with overfold is really, then, an instance of the
blending of the two types of dress, which later became so complete
that it is frequently difficult to decide whether a particular
garment should more correctly be called Doric or Ionic.
In some instances the overfold of the Ionic chiton is formed
in exactly the same way as that of the Doric dress, only it is
frequently shorter: it is turned over before the garment is put on,
then back and front are fastened together along the arm, either by
sewing or by brooches. In this latter case the only distinction from
the Doric dress, in addition to those of size and material, is that
instead of being pinned only once on each shoulder, and so being
sleeveless, it is pinned along from shoulder to elbow, so as to form
sleeves. An example of this is to be seen in a figure of Aphrodite
from a vase-painting in Paris reproduced by Miss Harrison.[116] This
style of dress, with the sleeves sewn instead of pinned, is found on
the first of the so-called Fates of the Parthenon pediment, and on
one of the Nereids from the Nereid monument, on a torso at Epidaurus,
and on many vase-paintings. Although not always represented in art,
shoulder-cords or cross-bands were probably actually worn with this
dress, as a general rule, since without some such contrivance it
would slip inconveniently.
[116] _Prolegomena to Greek Religion_, p. 292.
[Illustration: FIG. 29.—Vase-painting by Brygos—British Museum.
_Face page_ 66.]
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