English Costume by Dion Clayton Calthrop
Stephen 1135-1154
By Pauline Weston Thomas for Fashion-Era.com
English Costume by Dion Clayton Calthrop
Stephen 1135-1154
This costume history information consists of Pages 29 to
45 of the chapter on mid 12th century dress in the era of Stephen 1135-1154 and
is 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 19 year reign of King Stephen 1135-1154.
.
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.
Reigned nineteen years: 1135-1154.
Born 1094. Married, 1124, to Matilda of Boulogne.
THE MEN
When one regards the mass of material in existence showing costume of
the tenth and eleventh centuries, it appears curious that so little
fabric remains of this particular period.
The few pieces of fabric in existence are so worn and bare that they
tell little, whereas pieces of earlier date of English or Norman
material are perfect, although thin and delicate.
There are few illuminated manuscripts of the twelfth century, or of the
first half of it, and to the few there are all previous historians
of costume have gone, so that one is left without choice but to go also
to these same books. The possibilities, however, of the manuscripts
referred to have not been exhausted, and too much attention has been
paid to the queer drawing of the illuminators; so that where they
utilized to the full the artistic license, others have sought to pin it
down as accurate delineation of the costume of the time. In this I have
left out all the supereccentric costumes, fearing that such existed
merely in the imagination of the artist, and I have applied myself to
the more ordinary and understandable.
As there are such excellent works
on armour, I have not touched at all upon the subject, so that we are
left but the few simple garments that men wore when they put off their
armour, or that the peasant and the merchant habitually wore.
Ladies occupied their leisure in embroidery and other fine sewing, in
consequence of which the borders of tunics, of cloaks, the edgings of
sleeves, and bands upon the shoes, were elegantly patterned. The more
important the man, the finer his shoes.
Left - The man in the coloured costume plate wears a skin cloak
with smooth leather insides and which has a hood attached. His white
shirt sleeve is visible beneath his cloak. His ankle gaiters cover the
top of his shoes and his face is bearded. With regard to the first
paragraph below its important to note that textiles easily perish and
disintegrate after a few hundred years unless they are stored in perfect
dry or freezing conditions.
As will be seen from the drawings, the man wore his hair long,
smoothly parted in the centre, with a lock drawn down the parting from
the back of his head. As a rule, the hair curled back naturally, and
hung on the shoulders, but sometimes the older fashion of the past reign
remained, and the hair was carefully curled in locks and tied with
coloured ribbon.
Besides the hood as covering for the head, men wore one or other of the
simple caps shown, made of cloth or of fur, or of cloth fur-lined.
Next to his skin the man of every class wore a shirt of the pattern
shown - the selfsame shirt that we wear to day, excepting that the sleeves
were made very long and tight-fitting, and were pushed back over the
wrist, giving those wrinkles which we notice on all the Bayeux tapestry
sleeves, and which we see for many centuries in drawings of the
undergarment. The shape has always remained the same; the modes of
fastening the shirt differ very slightly - so little, in fact, that a
shirt of the fourth century which still remains in existence shows the
same button and loop that we notice of the shirts of the twelfth
century.
The richer man had his shirt embroidered round the neck and sometimes
at the cuffs. Over this garment the man wore his tunic - of wool, or
cloth, or (rarely) of silk; the drawing explains the exact making of it.
The tunic, as will be seen, was embroidered at the neck, the cuffs, and
round the border.
One drawing shows the most usual of these tunics, while the other
drawings will explain the variations from it - either a tight sleeve made
long and rolled back, a sleeve made very wide at the cuff and allowed to hang, or a sleeve made so that it
fell some way over the hand. It was embroidered inside and out at the
cuff, and was turned back to allow free use of the hand.
Over the tunic was worn the cloak, a very simple garment, being a piece
of cloth cut in the shape of a semicircle, embroidered on the border or
not, according to the purse and position of the owner. Sometimes a piece
was cut out to fit the neck.
Another form of cloak was worn with a hood. This was generally used for
travelling, or worn by such people as shepherds. It was made for the
richer folk of fine cloth, fur-lined, or entirely of fur, and for the
poorer people of skin or wool.
The cloak was fastened by a brooch, and was pinned in the centre or on
either shoulder, most generally on the right; or it was pushed through a
ring sewn on to the right side of the neck of the cloak.
The brooches were practically the same as those worn in the earlier
reigns, or were occasionally of a pure Roman design.
As will be seen in the small diagrams of men wearing the clothes of the
day, the tunic, the shirt, and the cloak were worn according to the
season, and many drawings in the MSS. of the date show men wearing the
shirt alone.
On their legs men wore trousers of leather for riding, bound round with
leather thongs, and trousers of wool also, bound with coloured straps of
wool or cloth.
Stockings of wool were worn, and cloth stockings also, and socks.
There was a sock without a foot, jewelled or embroidered round the top,
which was worn over the stocking and over the top of the boot in the
manner of ankle gaiters.
The country man wore twists of straw round his calf and ankle.
For the feet there were several varieties of boots and shoes made of
leather and stout cloth, now and again with wooden soles. As has been
said before, the important people rejoiced in elegant footgear of
all colours. All the shoes buttoned with one button above the outside
ankle.
The boots were sometimes tall, reaching to the bottom of the calf
of the leg, and were rolled over, showing a coloured lining. Sometimes
they were loose and wrinkled over the ankle. They were both, boot and
shoe, made to fit the foot; for in this reign nearly all the
extravagances of the previous reign had died out, and it is rare to find
drawings or mention of long shoes stuffed with tow or wool.
During the reign of Stephen the nation was too occupied in wars and
battles to indulge in excessive finery, and few arts flourished,
although useful improvements occurred in the crafts.
There is in the British Museum a fine enamelled plate of this date which
is a representation of Henry of Blois, Stephen's brother, who was the
Bishop of Winchester. Part of the inscription, translated by Mr. Franks,
says that 'Art is above gold and gems,' and that 'Henry, while living,
gives gifts of brass to God.'
Champlevé enamel was very finely made in the twelfth century, and many
beautiful examples remain, notably a plaque which was placed on the
column at the foot of which Geoffrey Plantagenet was buried. It is
a portrait of him, and shows the Byzantine influence still over the
French style.
This may appear to be rather apart from costume, but it leads one to
suppose that the ornaments of the time may have been frequently executed
in enamel or in brass - such ornaments as rings and brooches.
It is hard to say anything definite about the colours of the dresses at
this time. All that we can say is that the poorer classes were clothed
principally in self-coloured garments, and that the dyes used for the
clothes of the nobles were of very brilliant hues. But a street scene
would be more occupied by the colour of armour. One would have seen a
knight and men-at-arms - the knight in his plain armour and the men in
leather and steel; a few merchants in coloured cloaks, and the common
crowd in brownish-yellow clothes with occasional bands of colour
encircling their waists.
The more simply the people are represented, the more truthful will be
the picture or presentation. Few pictures of this exact time are
painted, and few stories are written about it, but this will give
all the information necessary to produce any picture or stage-play, or
to illustrate any story.
The garments are perfectly easy to cut out and make. In order to prove
this I have had them made from the bare outlines given here, without any
trouble.
THE WOMEN
Though many parts of England were at this time being harassed by
wars, still the domestic element grew and flourished.
The homes of the English from being bare and rude began to know the
delights of embroidery and weaving. The workroom of the ladies was the
most civilized part of the castle, and the effect of the Norman invasion
of foreign fashions was beginning to be felt.
As the knights were away to their fighting, so were the knights' ladies
engaged in sewing sleeve embroideries, placing of pearls upon shoes,
making silk cases for their hair, and otherwise stitching, cutting,
and contriving against the return of their lords.
It is recorded that Matilda escaped from Oxford by a postern in a
white dress, and no doubt her women sympathizers made much of white for
dresses.
The ladies wore a simple undergarment of thin material called a sherte
or camise; this was bordered with some slight embroidery, and had
tightish long sleeves pushed back over the wrist. The garment fell well
on to the ground. This camise was worn by all classes.
The upper garment was one of three kinds: made from the neck to below
the breast, including the sleeves of soft material; from the breast to
the hips it was made of some elastic material, as knitted wool or thin
cloth, stiffened by criss-cross bands of cloth, and was fitted to the
figure and laced up the back; the lower part was made of the same
material as the sleeves and bust.
The second was made tight-fitting in the body and bust, all of one
elastic material, and the skirt of loose thin stuff.
The third was a loose tunic reaching half-way between the knees and
feet, showing the camise, and tied about the waist and hips by a long
girdle.
The sleeves of these garments showed as many variations as those of the
men, but with the poor folk they were short and useful, and with the
rich they went to extreme length, and were often knotted to prevent them
from trailing on the ground.
The collar and the borders of the sleeves were enriched with embroidery
in simple designs.
In the case of the loose upper garment the border was also embroidered.
In winter a cloak of the same shape as was worn by the men was
used - i.e., cut exactly semicircular, with embroidered edges.
The shoes of the ladies were fitted to the foot in no extravagant shape,
and were sewn with bands of pearls or embroidery. The poorer folk went
about barefoot.
Right - The woman in the costume plate wears a dress that has been
made form fitting to her figure by lacing at the back. The dress has
extra long sleeves and these have been
tied up to keep them from trailing the ground. She holds a green
wimple in her hands and she was able to use that to cover up her
luxuriant braided hair. The plaited braids are are fastened
at the end into silken cases.
The hair was a matter of great moment and most carefully treated; it was
parted in the centre and then plaited, sometimes intertwined with
coloured ribbands or twists of thin coloured material; it was added
to in length by artificial hair, and was tied up in a number of ways.
Either it was placed in a tight silk case, like an umbrella case, which
came about half-way up the plait from the bottom, and had little tassels
depending from it, or the hair was added to till it reached nearly to
the feet, and was bound round with ribbands, the ends having little gold
or silver pendants. The hair hung, as a rule, down the front on either
side of the face, or occasionally behind down the back, as was the case
when the wimple was worn.
When the ladies went travelling or out riding they rode astride like
men, and wore the ordinary common-hooded cloak.
Brooches for the tunic and rings for the fingers were common among the
wealthy.
The plait was introduced into the architecture of the time, as is shown
by a Norman moulding at Durham.
Compared with the Saxon ladies, these ladies of Stephen's time were
elegantly attired; compared with the Plantagenet ladies, they were
dressed in the simplest of costumes. No doubt there were, as in all
ages, women who gave all their body and soul to clothes, who wore
sleeves twice the length of anyone else, who had more elaborate
plaits and more highly ornamented shoes; but, taking the period as a
whole, the clothes of both sexes were plainer than in any other period
of English history.
One must remember that when the Normans came into the country the
gentlemen among the Saxons had already borrowed the fashions prevalent
in France, but that the ladies still kept in the main to simple clothes;
indeed, it was the man who strutted to woo clad in all the fopperies of
his time - to win the simple woman who toiled and span to deck her lord in
extravagant embroideries.
The learning of the country was shared by the ladies and the clergy,
and the influence of Osburgha, the mother of Alfred, and Editha, the
wife of Edward the Confessor, was paramount among the noble ladies of
the country.
The energy of the clergy in this reign was more directed to
building and the branches of architecture than to the more studious and
sedentary works of illumination and writing, so that the sources from
which we gather information with regard to the costume in England are
few, and also peculiar, as the drawing of this date was, although
careful, extremely archaic.
Picture the market-town on a market day when the serfs were waiting to
buy at the stalls until the buyers from the abbey and the castle had had
their pick of the fish and the meat. The lady's steward and the
Father-Procurator bought carefully for their establishments, talking
meanwhile of the annual catch of eels for the abbey.
Picture Robese, the mother of Thomas, the son of Gilbert Becket,
weighing the boy Thomas each year on his birthday, and giving his weight
in money, clothes, and provisions to the poor. She was a type of the
devout housewife of her day, and the wife of a wealthy trader.
The barons were fortifying their castles, and the duties of their ladies
were homely and domestic. They provided the food for men-at-arms, the
followers, and for their husbands; saw that simples were ready with
bandages against wounds and sickness; looked, no doubt, to
provisions in case of siege; sewed with their maidens in a vestiary or
workroom, and dressed as best they could for their position.
What they
must have heard and seen was enough to turn them from the altar of
fashion to works of compassion. Their houses contained dreadful prisons
and dungeons, where men were put upon rachentegs, and fastened to these
beams so that they were unable to sit, lie, or sleep, but must starve.
From their windows in the towers the ladies could see men dragged,
prisoners, up to the castle walls, through the hall, up the staircase,
and cast, perhaps past their very eyes, from the tower to the moat
below.
Such times and sights were not likely to foster proud millinery
or dainty ways, despite of which innate vanity ran to ribbands in the
hair, monstrous sleeves, jewelled shoes, and tight waists. The tiring
women were not overworked until a later period, when the hair would take
hours to dress, and the dresses months to embroider.
In the town about the castle the merchants' wives wore simple homespun
clothes of the same form as their ladies. The serfs wore plain smocks
loose over the camise and tied about the waist, and in the bitter
cold weather skins of sheep and wolves unlined and but roughly dressed.
In 1154 the Treaty of Wallingford brought many of the evils to an end,
and Stephen was officially recognised as King, making
Henry his heir.
Before the year was out Stephen died.
I have not touched on ecclesiastical costume because there are so many
excellent and complete works upon such dress, but I may say that it was
above all civil dress most rich and magnificent.
I have given this slight picture of the time in order to show a reason
for the simplicity of the dress, and to show how, enclosed in their
walls, the clergy were increasing in riches and in learning; how,
despite the disorders of war, the internal peace of the towns and
hamlets was growing, with craft gilds and merchant gilds. The lords and
barons fighting their battles knew little of the bond of strength that
was growing up in these primitive labour unions; but the lady in her
bower, in closer touch with the people, receiving visits from foreign
merchants and pedlars with rare goods to sell or barter, saw how,
underlying the miseries of bloodshed and disaster, the land began to
bloom and prosper, to grow out of the rough place it had been into the
fair place of market-town and garden it was to be.
Meanwhile London's thirteen conventual establishments were added to by
another, the Priory of St. Bartholomew, raised by Rahere, the King's
minstrel.
Reigned nineteen years: 1135-1154.
Born 1094. Married, 1124, to Matilda of Boulogne.
This costume history information consists of Pages 29 to
45 of the chapter on 12th century dress in the era of Stephen 1135-1154 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 19 year reign of King Stephen 1135-1154.
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.
Fashion-Era.com looks at women's costume and fashion history and analyses the mood of an era. Changes in technology, leisure, work, cultural and moral values. Homelife and politics also
contribute to lifestyle trends, which in turn influence the clothes we wear. These are the changes that make any era of society special in relation to the study of the costume of a period.
Fashion-Era.com can take no responsibility for any information on the site which may cause you error, loss or costs incurred from use of the information and links either directly or
indirectly. This site is owned, designed, written and developed by author: Pauline Thomas and Guy Thomas. This site is designed to be viewed in 1024 X 768 or higher.
Before you write to me for costume/fashion help or information please, please consult the extensive sitemap which lists all our pages. If you still cannot find the answer after searching the site, then before you email me, please consider if you are prepared to make a donation to the website.
Donations Reader's donations help this site flourish, in particular donations encourage me to write more articles on fashion history as well as current trends. PayPal
allows anyone with a credit card to donate easily and securely. You may donate any sum you feel appropriate.
If you have any comments, or if you see any broken links, then please email with details of the page url or problem.
Find great anniversary gift ideas from Premier Gifts. Choose from our wide range of anniversary gifts to celebrate your special day in style.
Designer Inspired BagInc Fashion Bags and Cheap Handbags at Wholesale Rates.
.jpg)
The richer man had his shirt embroidered round the neck and sometimes
at the cuffs. Over this garment the man wore his tunic - of wool, or
cloth, or (rarely) of silk; the drawing explains the exact making of it.
The tunic, as will be seen, was embroidered at the neck, the cuffs, and
round the border.
worn, and cloth stockings also, and socks.
There was a sock without a foot, jewelled or embroidered round the top,
which was worn over the stocking and over the top of the boot in the
manner of ankle gaiters.
Though many parts of England were at this time being harassed by
wars, still the domestic element grew and flourished.
The sleeves of these garments showed as many variations as those of the
men, but with the poor folk they were short and useful, and with the
rich they went to extreme length, and were often knotted to prevent them
from trailing on the ground.
One must remember that when the Normans came into the country the
gentlemen among the Saxons had already borrowed the fashions prevalent
in France, but that the ladies still kept in the main to simple clothes;
indeed, it was the man who strutted to woo clad in all the fopperies of
his time - to win the simple woman who toiled and span to deck her lord in
extravagant embroideries.
