The Heritage of Dress: Being Notes on the History and Evolution of ClothesWebb, Wilfred Mark
History
The Heritage of Dress: Being Notes on the History and Evolution of Clothes
Webb, Wilfred Mark
Clothing and dress; Clothing and dress -- History
These tartans, as we may judge, date back to times of which we have no
record, but they have been used continuously in historic times. In the
accounts of King James III of Scotland, in 1471, there are several
entries with regard to money spent on tartans. The tartans, of course,
were a distinguishing mark of the various Scottish clans, but sometimes,
when attempts have been made to identify the patterns, confusion has
arisen owing to the fact that many clans had more than one tartan; in
fact, there may be the common clan tartan; that which was worn only
by the chief and his heir; a dress tartan; a fourth for hunting, and
a fifth for mourning. For instance, while the dress tartan of the
MacPhersons consists chiefly of black and white, with thin lines of red
and yellow, the hunting tartan of the same clan is black and buff, with
lines of blue and red. Similarly, in the Royal Stuart tartans, we find
that the ordinary Royal Stuart has large red squares, the hunting
tartan is mostly green and blue, while the dress Stuart has a large
amount of white in its composition. There was, of course, a wonderful
variety in colours, and it is interesting to note that all the dyes
required were obtained from common native plants.
In England, after the Norman Conquest, there seems to have been little
pattern used up to the time of Henry II, when diaper began to appear.
Just as damask takes its name from Damascus, so diaper originally
was derived from D'Ypres, meaning "of Ypres," a town which was noted
for rich stuffs and fine linen. In Edward II's time pied cloth and
parti-coloured silks came into vogue, while costumes of a parti-coloured
character, which developed in the following reign to such an extent,
were seen for the first time. Sometimes the whole dress would be
symmetrically divided, so that half was of one colour and half of
another. Again, the clothes would be striped in various directions, or
one would find the right arm and left leg coloured blue, while the other
two limbs were red. We get something of the same kind of ornamentation
nowadays, as already noticed, in the dress of jockeys and the colours of
athletic clubs.
In studying decorative patterns, the way in which some natural object
has often become conventionalized is very interesting to trace, and if
this is so in the case of art of civilized people, it is still more
true of savage decoration. Our object is not, however, to deal with the
evolution of ornamentation pure and simple, though we commend its study
to our readers.
Turning to the Jews for a moment, we may recall that part of the
adornment of the High Priests consisted of pomegranates and bells. The
connection does not seem at all obvious, and Mrs. Finn has suggested
that the bells are probably the flowers of the pomegranate which have
been conventionalized.
XXXIV
IMPRESSIONS TO BE GAINED FROM DRESS
CLUES FROM CLOTHES--INDIVIDUALITY NOT DISGUISED BY THEM--MODERN
DRESS OF OTHER COUNTRIES--SIGNIFICANCE OF CLOTHES
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