short breech, and the toes of the ankle-shoes are pointed so long
that holy men see visions of little devils using them as chariots.
The women love trailing gowns. They have under-skirts and
loose over-garments, sometimes sleeveless. Their hair at least
would not shock those earlier prelates who cursed the long
plaits, for it is caught up in a caul or braided at the sides of the
head. In the second half of the century men of rank borrow
from Germany the fashion of the cote-hardie. In its plainest
form this short tunic, covering the fork of the leg, is cut closely
to the body and arms (fig. 31). Sometimes the sleeve ends at
the elbow and then another streamer is added to the one which
falls from the hood, a strip of stuff continuing the elbow-sleeve
as low as the coat edge. This strip and the hem of the skirt are
often “slittered” with fanciful jags, a fashion which soon draws
down the satirist’s anger. Parti-coloured garments were an
added offence; a gentleman would have his coat parted down
the middle in red and white, with hose of white and red to match.
Men and women of rank wear a twisted garland of rich stuff,
crown-wise on the head, set with pearls and precious stones,
a fashion which is followed on the great helm of the knights,
being the “wreath” or “torce” of heraldry. The dames of
such as wear the cote-hardie imitate its tightness in the sleeves
and bodices of their long gown. A curious fashion which now
begins is the sleeveless upper gown whose sides are cut away
in curved sweeps from the shoulder to below the waist, the edges
of the opening being deeply furred. The strange head-dress with
a steeple-horn draped with lawn kerchiefs makes its appearance
to shock the moralists. Although it was probably a rare sight
in this century, the horn could easily fulfil its mission of drawing
notice to all its wearers.
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| Fig. 30.—English Ploughmen of the 14th century. |
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| Fig. 31.—Sons and Daughters of Edward III. (From his tomb in Westminster Abbey.) |
Of the cote-hardie it might at least be said that it was the symbol of a knightly age in arms, the garment of a man who must have hand and limbs free, and, save for its sleeves, it faithfully copied the coat-armour of the armed knight. The softer days of Richard II. are remarkable for a dress which has also its significance, men of high rank taking to themselves gowns of such fulness that the satirists may be justified who declare that men so clad may be hardly known from women. The close collar of these gowns rises high as the neckcloth of a French incroyable, the upper edge turned slightly over and jagged. The full skirts sweep on the ground, which is touched by the last jags of the vast sleeves, whose openings, wide as a woman’s skirts, are dagged like the edges of vine or oak leaves. “And but if the slevis,” says the satirist, “slide on the erthe, thei wolle be wroth as the wynde.” Sometimes this gown is slit at the sides that the gallant may the better show his coloured hose and tips of shoes that pike out two feet from heel to toe. When not wearing the gown such a lord would have a high-necked coat, shorter even than the cote-hardie, but looser in the skirt, the sleeves ending full and loose with dagged edges turned over at the cuff. Hats are more commonly worn in this century, and in its latter half take many shapes, a notable one being that of a shortened sugar-loaf or thimble with a brim turned up, either all round, or, more frequently, behind or before. The long shoes, as their name of crackowes or poleynes implies, were a fashion which, by repute, came from Poland, a land ruled by the grandfather of Richard’s first queen. When medieval fashions were past, they were remembered as a type of the old time, and a certain French conteur begins a tale of old days, not with jadis, but with “In the time when they wore poleynes.” Even parish priests, whose preaching should “dryve out the daggis and alle the Duche cotis,” went, in this age of fine apparel, gaily clad in gowns of scarlet and green, “shape of the newe,” in “cutted clothes” with “long pikes on her shone.” More than this, they made scandal by ruffling with weapons—“bucklers brode and sweardes long, bandrike with baselardes kene.” The skill of goldsmiths and craftsmen decorates all the appurtenances of the dress of this 14th century. Buttons, which appear in the first Edward’s time as a scandalous ornament on men of low degree, have now become common, and, cunningly wrought, are used as much for queintise as for service. A close row of them will run from wrist to elbow of tight sleeve. A row of buttons goes from the neck of a woman’s gown, and the cote-hardie may be fastened down the front with a dozen and a half of rich buttons. A purse or gipciere hung by a ring to the girdle gives more room for ornament in the silver or brass bar on which the bag depends. Above all the girdle, which—in harness or in silk—rich men wear broad and bossed with jewels across the thigh below the waist, makes work for the jeweller’s craftsman. Such a girdle is for great folk alone; but lesser men, wearing a strap about their waists, will yet have a handsome buckle and a fanciful pendant of metal guarding the loose end of the strap.
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| Fig. 32.—Henry, Prince of Wales, and Occleve the Poet (c. 1410). (From Arundel MS. 38.) |
However fantastic the fashions of this or any other ages, folk of the middling sort will avoid the extremes. From the Knight to the Reve, no man of Chaucer’s company calls to us by the fantasy of his clothing. The Knight himself rides in his fustian gipoun, the grime of his habergeon upon it, although his son’s short gown, the gayest garment at the Tabard, had long and wide sleeves and is embroidered with flowers like any mead. A coat and hood of green mark the Yeoman, who has a silver Christopher brooch for ornament. The Merchant is in motley stuff, his beaver hat from Flanders and his clasped boots taking Chaucer’s eye, as do the anlas and silken gipser which hang at the rich Franklin’s belt. As for the London burgesses, their knife-chapes, girdles and pouches are in clean silver. The Shipman wears his knife in a lanyard about his neck, as his fellows do to this day, and his coat is of coarse falding to the knee. The Wife of Bath has the wimple below her broad hat and rides in a foot mantle about her hips. Poorer men’s dress is on the Reve and the Ploughman, the one in a long surcote of sky-blue and the other in the tabard which we may recognize as that smock-frock which goes down the ages with little change.
In the 15th century the middle ages run out. Fashions in this period become, if not more fantastic, more various. Its earlier years see men of rank still inclined to the rich modes of the last age: Harry of Monmouth, drawn 15th century.about 1410 by an artist who shows him as Occleve’s patron, wears a blue gown which might have passed muster at the
