The chiton and himation, as above described, continued to be the standard dress from 450 B. C. onward. The hair was most usually worn gathered back from the temples, and fastened in a knot behind by hair-pins of ivory or bone, either plain or mounted with gold. For the feet, sandals were usually worn, in exceptional cases shoes, and for hunting, high boots. Gloves were never worn by the Greeks, except to protect the hands in working. From the time of Pericles, the great European distinction between male and female dress consisted in the length of the skirt, old men, priests, and officials being allowed the privilege of wearing long or women’s skirts, and young girls being permitted to wear the short or man’s skirt. Among the Romans, this single garment, worn by both sexes, was called the toga. As time rolled on, this loose cord, which had formed the girdle, was reinforced by a broad belt or band to support the breasts. Among the Assyrians this belt was made of stiffened linen or thin metal; the Egyptians wore a folded belt; a broad belt for supporting the breasts was also worn by the Roman ladies. But whatever the material used, this stay-belt does not show any signs of tight laces or of vertical ribs of iron or bone. It was, however, the forerunner of “stays,” and when the moral fiber of the Greeks grew lax, the courtesans set the fashions, and dress was used to display rather than to conceal the figure, and, in order to make the hips more prominent, the waist was constricted by a many-layered belt. At the same time, the use of cosmetics was introduced. =The Mediæval or Middle Ages.=—From the end of the fifth century to the beginning of the seventeenth there was a singular resemblance in many marked particulars between the dress of the two sexes. It now became the object of dress in both sexes not merely to clothe the person, but also to display the figure and adorn it. In the temperate climates there are always greater changes in fashion than in the very hot or very cold. Subjugation by the Romans in the first centuries of the Christian era was followed by a general conformity to their mode of dress, so that the Roman dress may be considered to have become European. In marked contrast to the loose, flowing robes worn by the southern nations of Europe in their decadence were the short skirts and jackets clinging to the limbs, which were worn by the hardy nations of the North, who were given to constant fighting and the pursuit of the chase. The Norman lords, following the fashion of the south, swept about in long tunics and flowing robes. In the twelfth century the Anglo-Saxon women, dressed in their loose garments, were indebted to the Norman ladies for the introduction of “stays,” and the fashion of tightly lacing the body with a robe, laced down in front in order to show its undulations, as well as the use of cosmetics.