This costume history information consists of Pages
92-101 of the chapter on the early 14th century dress in the era of
Edward The Second 1307 -1327 and taken from English Costume by Dion Clayton Calthrop.
The 36 page section consists of a text copy of the book ENGLISH
COSTUME PAINTED & DESCRIBED BY DION CLAYTON CALTHROP. Visuals,
drawings and painted fashion plates in the book have a charm of their own and are
shown amid the text. The book covers both male and female dress history of
over 700 years spanning the era 1066-1830.
This page is about dress in
the 20 year reign of King Edward The Second 1307 -1327. The images
and details are a good resource for how-to costume designs for
Shakespeare's stage plays of the Plantagenet era.
.
For the Introduction to this book see this
introduction written by Dion Clayton Calthrop. I have adjusted
the images so they are mostly 400 pixels high and can be used for colouring
worksheets where pupils add some costume/society facts. My comments are in italics.
EDWARD THE SECOND
Reigned twenty years: 1307-1327.
Born 1284. Married, 1308, Isabella of France.
MEN AND WOMEN
Whether the changes in costume that took place in this reign were due to
enterprising tailors, or to an exceptionally hot summer, or to the fancy
of the King, or to the sprightliness of Piers Gaveston, it is not
possible to say. Each theory is arguable, and, no doubt, in some measure
each theory is right, for, although men followed the new mode, ladies
adhered to their earlier fashions.
Take the enterprising tailor - call him an artist. The old loose robe was
easy of cut; it afforded no outlet for his craft; it cut into a lot of
material, was easily made at home - it was, in fact, a baggy affair that
fitted nowhere. Now, is it not possible that some tailor-artist, working
upon the vanity of a lordling who was proud of his figure, showed how
he could present this figure to its best advantage in a body-tight
garment which should reach only to his hips?
Take the hot summer. You may or may not know that a hot summer some
years ago suddenly transformed the City of London from a place of
top-hats and black coats into a place of flannel jackets and hats of
straw, so that it is now possible for a man to arrive at his City office
clad according to the thermometer, without incurring the severe
displeasure of the Fathers of the City.
It seems that somewhere midway between 1307 and 1327 men suddenly
dropped their long robes, loosely tied at the waist, and appeared in
what looked uncommonly like vests, and went by the name of 'cotehardies.'
It must have been surprising to men who remembered England clothed in
long and decorous robes to see in their stead these gay, debonair, tight
vests of pied cloth or parti-coloured silk.
Piers Gaveston, the gay, the graceless but graceful favourite,
clever at the tournament, warlike and vain, may have instituted this
complete revolution in clothes with the aid of the weak King.
Sufficient, perhaps, to say that, although long robes continued to be
worn, cotehardies were all the fashion.
There was a general tendency to exaggeration. The hood was attacked
by the dandies, and, instead of its modest peak, they caused to be added
a long pipe of the material, which they called a 'liripipe.'
Every quaint thought and invention for tying up this liripipe was used:
they wound it about their heads, and tucked the end into the coil;
they put it about their necks, and left the end dangling; they rolled it
on to the top of their heads.
The countryman, not behindhand in quaint ideas, copied the form of a
Bishop's hood, and appeared with his cloth hood divided into two peaks,
one on either side of his head.
This new cotehardie was cut in several ways. Strictly speaking, it
was a cloth or silk vest, tight to the body, and close over the hips;
the length was determined by the fancy of the wearer. It also had
influence on the long robes still worn, which, although full below the
waist to the feet, now more closely fitted the body and shoulders.
The fashionable sleeves (shown above) were tight to the elbow, and from there hanging
and narrow, showing a sleeve belonging to an undergarment.
The cloak also varied in shape. The heavy travelling-cloak, with the
hood attached, was of the old pattern, long, shapeless, with or without
hanging sleeves, loose at the neck, or tightly buttoned.
Then there was a hooded cloak, with short sleeves, or with the sleeves
cut right away, a sort of hooded surcoat. Then there were two distinct
forms of cape: one a plain, circular cape, not very deep, which had a
plain, round, narrow collar of fur or cloth, and two or three buttons at
the neck; and there was the round cape, without a collar, but with
turned back lapels of fur. This form of cape is often to be seen.
The boots and shoes were longer at the toes, and were sometimes buttoned
at the sides.
The same form of hats remain, but these were now treated with fur brims.
Round the waist there was always a belt, generally of plain black
leather; from it depended a triangular pouch, through which a dagger was
sometimes stuck.
Left - Notice the how long the trailing liripipe on the man's hood
is in this era. Observe his short
tunic of rayed cloth, the hanging sleeve and his slim fit under-sleeve.
Dressing the hair was important and the woman has her hair dressed in two side-plaits.
The throat gorget
or neckcloth has been pinned to her plaits.
The time of parti-coloured clothes was just beginning, and the
cotehardie was often made from two coloured materials, dividing the body
in two parts by the colour difference; it was the commencement of
the age which ran its course during the next reign, when men were
striped diagonally, vertically, and in angular bars; when one leg was
blue and the other red.
You will note that all work was improving in this reign when you hear
that the King paid the wife of John de Bureford 100 marks for an
embroidered cope, and that a great green hanging was procured for King's
Hall, London, for solemn feasts - a hanging of wool, worked with figures
of kings and beasts. The ladies made little practical change in their
dress, except to wear an excess of clothes against the lack of draperies
indulged in by the men.
It is possible to see three garments, or portions of them, in many
dresses.
First, there was a stuff gown, with tight sleeves buttoned to
the elbow from the wrist; this sometimes showed one or two buttons under the gorget in front, and was fitted, but not tightly, to the
figure. It fell in pleated folds to the feet, and had a long train; this
was worn alone, we may suppose, in summer.
Second, there was a gown to
go over this other, which had short, wide sleeves, and was full in the
skirts. One or other of these gowns had a train, but if the upper gown
had a train the under one had not, and vice versâ.
Third, there was a
surcoat like to a man's, not over-long or full, with the sleeve-holes
cut out wide; this went over both or either of the other gowns.
Upon the head they wore the wimple, the fillet, and about the throat
the gorget.
The arrangement of the wimple and fillet were new, for the hair was now
plaited in two tails, and these brought down straight on either
side of the face; the fillet was bound over the wimple in order to show
the plait, and the gorget met the wimple behind the plait instead of
over it.
The older fashion of hair-dressing remained, and the gorget was pinned
to the wads of hair over the ears, without the covering of the wimple.
Sometimes the fillet was very wide, and placed low on the head over a
wimple tied like a gorget; in this way the two side-plaits showed only
in front and appeared covered at side-face, while the wimple and broad
fillet hid all the top hair of the head.
Very rarely a tall, steeple head-dress was worn over the wimple, with a
hanging veil; but this was not common, and, indeed, it is not a mark of
the time, but belongs more properly to a later date. However, I have
seen such a head-dress drawn at or about this time, so must include it.
It may seem that I describe these garments in too simple a way, and the
rigid antiquarian would have made comment on courtepys, on gamboised
garments, on cloth of Gaunt, or cloth of Dunster.
I may tell you that a gambeson was the quilted tunic worn under
armour, and, for the sake of those whose tastes run into the arid fields
of such research, that you may call it wambasium, gobison, wambeys,
gambiex, gaubeson, or half a dozen other names; but, to my mind, you
will get no further with such knowledge.
Falding is an Irish frieze; cyclas is a gown; courtepy is a short gown;
kirtle - again, if we know too much we cannot be accurate - kirtle may be a
loose gown, or an apron, or a jacket, or a
riding-cloak.
The tabard was an embroidered surcoat - that is, a surcoat on which
was displayed the heraldic device of the ownerCyclas
Let us close this reign with its mournful end, when Piers Gaveston feels
the teeth of the Black Dog of Warwick, and is beheaded on Blacklow Hill;
when Hugh le Despenser is hanged on a gibbet; when the Queen lands at
Orwell, conspiring against her husband, and the King is a prisoner at
Kenilworth.
Here at Kenilworth the King hears himself deposed.
'Edward, once King of England,' is hereafter accounted 'a private
person, without any manner of royal dignity.'
Here Edward, in a plain black gown, sees the steward of his household,
Sir Thomas Blount, break his staff of office, done only when a King is
dead, and discharge all persons engaged in the royal service.
Parliament decided to take this strong measure in January; in the
following September Edward was murdered in cold blood at Berkeley
Castle.
EDWARD THE SECOND
Reigned twenty years: 1307-1327.
Born 1284. Married, 1308, Isabella of France.
This costume history information consists of Pages
92-101 of the chapter on the early 14th century dress in the era of
Edward The Second 1307 -1327 and taken from English Costume by Dion Clayton Calthrop.
The 36 page section consists of a text copy of the book ENGLISH
COSTUME PAINTED & DESCRIBED BY DION CLAYTON CALTHROP. Visuals,
drawings and painted fashion plates in the book have a charm of their own and are
shown amid the text. The book covers both male and female dress history of
over 700 years spanning the era 1066-1830.
This page is about dress in
the 20 year reign of King Edward The Second 1307 -1327. The images
and details are a good resource for how-to costume designs for
Shakespearean stage plays of the Plantagenet era.
For the Introduction to this book see this
introduction written by Dion Clayton Calthrop. I have adjusted
the images so they are mostly 400 pixels high and can be used for colouring
worksheets where pupils add some costume/society facts. My comments are in italics.
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This costume history information consists of Pages
92-101 of the chapter on the early 14th century dress in the era of
Edward The Second 1307 -1327 and taken from English Costume by Dion Clayton Calthrop.
