Middle Ages Fashion

Linda Jan Jonathan Chiao

Trend
The clothing and fashion during the Middle Ages was dominated and highly influenced by the Kings and Queens Only the wealthy could dress in fashionable clothes. Sumptuary Laws restricted people in their expenditure including money spent on clothes.

900 1000
influenced by the classical styles of the Greek and Roman women so tight as to display all the elegance of their form made so high as completely to cover the neck consisted of two tunics, and of a veil or drapery

1100-1200
Men
shirt, braies, and chausses Outer tunics or doublets Headgear

Women

shirt, braies, and chausses

Underclothes consisted of an inner tunic (French chainse) or shirt with long, tight sleeves, and drawers or braies, usually of linen. Tailored cloth leggings called chausses or hose, made as separate garments for each leg, were often worn with the tunic; striped hose were popular. Hose were long and fit, and they reached above the knees. They were wide enough at the top to allow the drawers to be tucked into them. They were held up in place by being attached to the girdle of the drawers.

Outer tunics or doublets

Over the undertunic and hose, men wore an outer tunic that reached to the knees or ankles, and that was fastened at the waist with a belt. Fitted bliauts, of wool or, increasingly, silk, had sleeves that were cut wide at the wrist and gored skirts. Men wore bliauts open to the waist front and back or at the side seams. Newly fashionable were short, fitted garments for the upper body, worn under the tunic: the doublet, made of two layers of linen, and an early form of quilted and padded jupe or gipon. Rectangular and circular cloaks were worn over the tunic. These fastened on the right shoulder or at the center front.

Headgear
Men of the upper classes often went hatless. The chaperon in the form of hood and attached shoulder-length cape was worn during this period, especially by the rural lower classes, and the fitted linen coif tied under the chin appeared very late in the century. Small round or slightly conical caps with rolled brims were worn, and straw hats were worn for outdoor work in summer.

Women
A cap was worn made of linen with lappets hanging down over the shoulders The surcoat was at first worn only by females, but it was soon adopted by both genders a broad band, which was tied under the chin, and gave the appearance of a kind of frame for the face

1200 - 1300
Men
Higher class [People who were richer] Working men

Women

Men
Men wore a tunic, cote or cotte with a surcoat over a linen shirt. One of these surcoats was the cyclas, which began as a rectangular piece of cloth with a hole in it for the head. Over time the sides were sewn together to make a long, sleeveless tunic. When sleeves and sometimes a hood were added, the cyclas became a ganache (a cap-sleeved surcoat, usually shown with hood of matching color) or a gardcorps (a long, generous-sleeved traveling robe, somewhat resembling a modern academic robe). A mantle was worn as a formal wrap. Men also wore hose, shoes, and headdress. The clothing of royalty was set apart by its rich fabric and luxurious furs. Hair and beard were moderate in length, and men generally wore their hair in a "pageboy" style, curling under at necklength. Shoes were slightly pointed, and embroidered for royalty and higher clergy.

Working Men
short cotte, or tunic, with a belt. slit up the center of the front long braies or leggings with legs of varying length, often visible as they worked with their cotte tucked into their belt. Hose could be worn over, attached to the drawstring or belt at the waist. Hats included a round cap with a slight brim, the beret (just like modern French ones, complete with a little tab at the top), the coif (a little tight white hood with strings that tied under the chin), the straw hat (in widespread use among farmworkers), and the chaperon, then still a hood that came round the neck and over the shoulders. Apart from aprons for trades like smithing, and crude clothes tied round the neck to hold seed for sowing, special clothes were not worn for working.

Women
Luxury was at its height when gold and silver, pearls and precious stones were lavished on clothes Gowns with tight bodices were generally adopted a tight jacket, reaching to a little below the hips, often trimmed with fur

1300 - 1400
Mens fashion
shirt, braies, and chausses Tunic and coteheardie Headgear

Womens Fashion

shirt, braies, and chausses

The innermost layer of clothing were the braies or breeches, a loose undergarment, usually made of linen, which was held up by a belt. Next came the shirt, which was generally also made of linen, and which was considered an undergarment, like the breeches. Hose or chausses made out of wool were used to cover the legs, and were generally brightly colored, and often had leather soles, so that they did not have to be worn with shoes. The shorter clothes of the second half of the century required these to be a single garment like modern tights, whereas otherwise they were two separate pieces covering the full length of each leg. Hose were generally tied to the breech belt, or to the breeches themselves, or to a double A doublet was a buttoned jacket that was generally of hip length. Similar garments were called cotehardie, pourpoint, jaqueta or jubn. These garments were worn over the shirt and the hose.

Tunic and coteheardie

A gown, tunic, or kirtle was usually worn over the shirt or doublet. As with other outer garments, it was generally made of wool. Over this, a man might also wear an over-kirtle, cloak, or a hood. Servants and working men wore their kirtles at various lengths, including as low as the knee or calf. However the trend during the century was for hem-lengths to shorten for all classes. In the second half of the century, courtiers are often shown, if they have the figure for it, wearing nothing over their closely tailored cotehardie. This fashion may well have derived from military clothing, where long loose gowns were naturally not worn in action. At this period, the most dignified figures continue to wear long gownsalthough as the Royal Chamberlain, de Vaudetar was himself a person of very high rank. This abandonment of the gown to emphasize a tight top over the torso, with breeches or trousers below, was to become the distinctive feature of European men's fashion for centuries to come. Men had carried purses up to this time because tunics did not provide pockets.

Headgear and Accessories

During this century, the chaperon made a transformation from being a utilitarian hood with a small cape to becoming a complicated and fashionable hat worn by the wealthy in town settings. Belts were worn below waist at all times, and very low on the hips with the tightly fitted fashions of the latter half of the century. Belt pouches or purses were used, and long daggers, usually hanging diagonally to the front. In armor, the century saw increases in the amount of plate armor worn, and by the end of the century the full suit had been developed, although mixtures of chain mail and plate remained more common.

Women
The hair was kept back by a silken net The fashion of wearing false hair continued in great favor Women's clothing, the coats and surcoats, often trailed on the ground Hats consisted of a frame of wirework covered over with stuff which was embroidered with lace

1400 - 1500
Mens fashion
shirt, braies, and chausses Outer tunics or doublets Headgear

Women

shirt, braies, and chausses

The basic costume of men in this period consisted of a shirt, doublet, and hose, with some sort of overgown. Linen shirts were worn next to the skin. Toward the end of the period, shirts (French chemise, Italian camicia, Spanish camisa) began to be full through the body and sleeves with wide, low necklines; the sleeves were pulled through the slashings or piecing of the doublet sleeves to make puffs, especially at the elbow and the back of the arm. As the cut of doublets revealed more fabric, wealthy men's shirts were often decorated with embroidery or applied braid. Over the shirt was worn a doublet. From around the mid-century very tight-fitting doublets, belted or tailored to be tight at the waist, giving in effect a short skirt below, were fashionable, at least for the young. Sleeves were generally full, even puffy, and when worn with a large chaperon, the look was extremely stylish, but very top-heavy. Very tight hose, and long pointed shoes or thigh-boots gave a long attenuated appearance below the waist, and a chunky, solid one above. The doublet was often elaborately pleated, especially at the back, the pleats being achieved by various means. Men of all classes wore short braies or breeches, a loose undergarment, usually made of linen, which was held up by a belt. The hose exposed by short tops were, especially in Italy late in the century, often strikingly patterned, parti-colo red (different colors for each leg, or vertically divided), or embroidered. Hose were cut on the cross-grain or bias for stretch.

Outer tunics or doublets

The Houppelande, in Italy called the cioppa, is the characteristic overgarment of the wealthy in the first half of the 15th century. It was essentially a gown with fullness falling from the shoulders in organ pleats and very full sleeves often reaching to the floor with, at the start of the century, a high collar. The houppelande could be lined in fur, and the hem and sleeves might be dagged or cut into scallops. It was initially often worn belted, but later mostly hanging straight. The length of the garment shortened from around the ankle to above the knee over this period. The floor-length sleeves were later wrist-length but very full, forming a bag or sack sleeve, or were worn off the arm, hanging ornamentally behind. A sideless overgown or tabard, called a giornea in Italy and a journade in France, was popular. It was usually pleated and was worn hanging loose or belted. Young men wore them short and older men wore them calf- or ankle-length. The middle of the century in Burgundy saw what seems to have been the earliest occurrence of the male fashion for dressing all in black, which was to reappear so strongly in the "Spanish" style of the mid-16th17th century and again in the 19th 20th centuries. In the last decades of the century, a new style of gown appeared; this was of various lengths, generally worn unbelted, and featured wide turned back revers and collar.

Headgear
Early in the century, the hood remained a common component of dress for all classes, although it was frequently worn around the neck as a cowl or twisted into the fantastical shapes of the chaperon. Hats of various stylestall-crowned with small brims or no brims at all, or low-crowned with wider brims pulled to a point in frontbegan to compete with the draped chaperon, especially in Italy. A brimless scarlet cap became nearly universal for young Florentines in particular, and was widely worn by older men and those in other cities. In mid-century, a bowl haircut with the hair shaved at the back of the neck was stylish. In Germany, and briefly in Venice, a wide shock of frizzy blond hair was often seen on images of lovers (and angels) in the later part of the centuryless often in portraits. By the end of the century, shoulder-length hair became fashionable, a trend that would continue into the early 16th century.

Women
Women wore long trains to their dresses, but were shortened. They began to uncover the neck and to wear necklaces The head-dresses of women consisted of very large rolls, surmounted by a high conical bonnet