The comfortable advantage of reindeer skin was appreciated by the Norwegian peasants in their dress of olden times, and cloaks of this were generally worn until the city of Bergen was built by King Oluf in the eleventh century, and the coming of foreign merchants introduced a variety of new fashions. According to Norwegian chroniclers, the natives took greedily to fine laced hose, golden plates buckled round their legs, high-heeled shoes stitched with silk and covered with tissue of gold, jackets that buttoned on the side, with sleeves ten feet long, pleated up to the shoulders.
The long reindeer-skin garment did not, however, disappear entirely, until the rule of short clothes and bare legs was inaugurated by King Magnus Olufsen.
The varieties of fashion do not seem to affect the peasants now; they note with indifference the changes of costume, and cling mainly to the dress which has descended through many generations. Their breeches and stockings are cut in one; their waistcoats are of woollen material with the seams covered with cloth of different colour; on their heads they wear brown, grey, or black caps, or broadly brimmed hats; while their heel-less shoes are made of two pieces of leather, and the laced half-boots used in winter are covered with sealskin.
The Swedish peasants are devoted to long coats of cloth lined with sheepskin, and the women choose their woollen gowns striped with green and white and red.
The Norwegian fête dress consists of a laced jacket and leather girdle set with silver, and indispensable are many rows of chain holding a gilt or silver pendant. The kerchief and cap are covered
