Clothing Culture, 1350-1650

by Richardson,Catherine

• ISBN13: 9780754638421
• ISBN10: 0754638421
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2016-02-16
• Publisher: Routledge

Summary

Tackling the issue of clothing in relation to such fundamental issues as national identity, social distinction, gender, the body, religion and politics, Clothing Culture, 1350-1650 provides a springboard into one of the most fascinating yet least understood aspects of social and cultural history.Nowhere in medieval and early modern European society was its hierarchical and social divisions more obviously reflected than in the sphere of clothing. Indeed, one of the few constant themes of writers, chroniclers, diarists and commentators - from Chaucer to Pepys - was the subject of fashion and clothes. Whether it was lauding the magnificence of court, warning against the vanity of fashion, describing the latest modes, or decrying the habit of the lower orders to ape the dress of their social superiors, people throughout history have been fascinated by the symbolism, power and messages that clothes can project.

Table of Contents

General Editor's Preface	vii
List of Illustrations	viii
List of Tables	xi
List of Contributors	xii
Acknowledgements	xv
List of Abbreviations	xvi
1 Introduction
Catherine Richardson	1	(28)
Section One: Fabrics of Nation
2 The Cultural Significance of Costume Books in Sixteenth-Century Europe	29	(20)
Ulrike Ilg
3 A Question of Nation: Foreign Clothes on the English Subject	49	(14)
Roze Hentschell
4 Tomb Effigies and Archaic Dress in Sixteenth-Century Ireland	63	(14)
Elizabeth Wincott Heckett
5 The Formation of Russian Women's Costume at the Time before the Reforms of Peter the Great	77	(18)
Oksana Sekatcheva
Section Two: Marking Distinctions
6 Clothing Courtesans: Fabrics, Signals, and Experiences	95	(14)
Tessa Storey
7 Clothing the Naked in Late Medieval East Kent	109	(14)
Sheila Sweetinburgh
8 Dress, Nudity and Calvinist Culture in Sixteenth-Century France	123	(14)
Graeme Murdock
9 Social Fabric in Thynne's Debate Between Pride and Lowliness	137
Claire Bartram
Section Three: Material Movements
10 Clothing Distributions and Social Relations c.1350-1500	153	(12)
Joanna Crawford
11 Fashion, Finance, Foreign Politics and the Wardrobe of Henry VIII	165	(14)
Maria Hayward
12 Reworked Material: Discourses of Clothing Culture in Early Sixteenth-Century Greenwich	179	(16)
Elisabeth Salter
Section Four: Discourse, Body, Gender
13 'This one poore blacke gowne lined with white': The Clothing of the Sixteenth-Century English Book	195	(14)
Helen Smith
14 'Havying nothing upon hym saving onely his sherte': Event, Narrative and Material Culture in Early Modern England	209	(14)
Catherine Richardson
15 Rips and Slits: The Torn Garment and the Medieval Self	223	(16)
Andrea Denny-Brown
16 Speaking to Reveal: The Body and Acts of 'Exposure' in Early Modern Popular Discourse	239	(24)
Elizabeth Hallam
Bibliography	263	(24)
Index	287