with white paint) regularly worn by the male sex, though
we sometimes find a hood or wrapper, as on a lead statuette
found in Laconia (fig. 16), but the Aegean women developed
it into a bodice-and-skirt costume, well represented by the
frescoes of Cnossus and
the statuettes of the
snake-goddess and her
votaries there discovered.
This transformation
of the loin-cloth
has been illustrated
by Mr D. Mackenzie (see
below) from Cretan seal-impressions.
In place
of the belted kilt of the
men we find a belted
panier or polonaise, considerably
elongated in
front, worn by Aegean
women; and Mackenzie
shows that this was repeated
several times
until it formed the
compound skirt with a
number of flounces which
is represented on many
Mycenaean gems. On a fresco discovered at Phaestus (Hagia
Triada) (fig. 17) and a sealing from the same place this multiple
skirt is clearly shown as divided; but this does not seem to have
been the general rule. On other sealings we find a single overskirt
with a pleated underskirt. The skirts were held in place by a
thick rolled belt, and the upper part of the body remained quite
nude in the earliest times; but from the middle Minoan period
onward we often find an important addition in the shape of a
low-cut bodice, which sometimes has sleeves, either tight-fitting or
puffed, and ultimately develops into a laced corsage. A figurine
from Petsofá (fig. 18) shows the bodice-and-skirt costume,
together with a high pointed head-dress, in one of its most
elaborate forms. The bodice has a high peaked collar at the
back. Other forms of head-dress are seen on the great signet
from Mycenae. The fact that both male and female costume
amongst the primitive Aegean peoples is derivable from the
simple loin-cloth with additions is rightly used by Mackenzie as a
proof that their original home is not to be sought in the colder
regions of central Europe, but in a warm climate such as that of
North Africa. It is not until the latest Mycenaean period that
we find brooches, such as were used in historical Greece, to fasten
woollen garments, and their presence in the tombs of the lower
city of Mycenae indicates the coming of a northern race.
 | |
| From Monumenti antichi (Acad. Lincei). | From Annual of the Brit. School at Athens. |
| Fig. 17.—Part of a Fresco discovered at Phaestus. | Fig. 18.—Terra-cotta Statuette from Petsofá. |
See Annual of the British School at Athens, ix. 356 sqq. (Myres); xii. 233 sqq. (Mackenzie); Tsountas and Manatt, The Mycenaean Age, ch. vii.
iii. Greek Costume.—All articles of Greek costume belong either to the class of ἐνδύματα, more or less close-fitting, sewn garments, or of περιβλήματα, loose pieces of stuff draped round the body in various ways and fastened with pins or brooches. For the former class the generic name is χιτών;, a word of Semitic origin, which denotes the Eastern origin of the garment; for the latter we find in Homer and early poetry πέπλος, in later times ἱμάτιον. The πέπλος (also called ἑανός and φᾶρος in Homer) was the sole indispensable article of dress in early Greece, and, as it was always retained as such by the women in Dorian states, is often called the “Doric dress” (ἐσθὴς Δωρίς). It was a square piece of woollen stuff about a foot longer than the height of the wearer, and equal in breadth to twice the span of the arms measured from wrist to wrist. The upper edge was folded over for a distance equal to the space from neck to waist—this folded portion was called ἀπόπτυγμα or διπλοΐς,—and the whole garment was then doubled and wrapped round the body below the armpits, the left side being closed and the right open. The back and front were then pulled up over the shoulders and fastened together with brooches like safety-pins (περόναι). This was the Doric costume, which left the right side of the body exposed and provoked the censure of Euripides (Andr. 598). It was usual, however, to hold the front and back of the πέπλος together by a girdle (ζώνη), passed round the waist below the ἀπόπτυγμα; the superfluous length of the garment was pulled up through the girdle and allowed to fall over in a baggy fold (κόλπος) (see Greek Art, fig. 75). Sometimes the ἀπόπτυγμα was made long enough to fall below the waist, and the girdle passed outside it (cf. the figure of Artemis on the vase shown in Greek Art, fig. 29); this was the fashion in which the Athena Parthenos of Pheidias was draped. The “Attic” or “Corinthian” πέπλος was sewn together on the right side from below the arm, and thus became an ἔνδυμα. The πέπλος was worn in a variety of colours and often decorated with bands of ornament, both horizontal and vertical; Homer uses the epithets κροκόπεπλος and κυανόπεπλος, which show that yellow and dark blue πέπλοι were worn, and speaks of embroidered πέπλοι (ποικίλοι). Such embroideries are indicated by painting on the statues from the Acropolis and are often shown on vase paintings.
The chiton, χιτών, was formed by sewing together at the sides two pieces of linen, or a double piece folded together, leaving spaces at the top for the arms and neck, and fastening the top edges together over the shoulders and upper arm with buttons or brooches; more rarely we find a plain sleeveless chiton. The length of the garment varied considerably. The χιτωνίσκος, worn in active exercise, as by the so-called “Atalanta” of the Vatican, or the well-known Amazon statues (Greek Art, fig. 40), reached only to the knee; the χιτὼν ποδήρης covered the feet. This long, trailing garment was especially characteristic of Ionia; in the Homeric poems (Il. xiii. 685) we read of the Ίαόνες ἑλκεχίτωνες. If worn without a girdle it went by the name of χιτὼν ὀρθοστάδιος. The long chiton was regularly used by musicians (e.g. Apollo the lyre-player) and charioteers. In ordinary life it was generally pulled up through the girdle and formed a κόλπος (Greek Art, fig. 2).
Herodotus (v. 82-88) tells a story (cf. Aegina), the details of which are to all appearance legendary, in order to account for a change in the fashion of female dress which took place at Athens in the course of the 6th century B.C. Up to that time the “Dorian dress” had been universal, but the Athenians now gave up the use of garments fastened with pins or brooches, and adopted the linen chiton of the Ionians. The statement of Herodotus is illustrated both by Attic vase-paintings and also by the series of archaic female statues from the Acropolis of Athens, which (with the exception of one clothed in the Doric πέπλος) wear the Ionic chiton, together with an outer garment, sometimes laid over both shoulders like a cloak (Greek Art, fig. 3), but more usually fastened on the right shoulder only, and passed diagonally across the body so as to leave the left arm
