Women of England

by Bartlett Burleigh James

But when the belief in witchcraft led to papal promulgations against it and against all who dared entertain doubts upon the subject, and when it led also to the appointment of tribunals for the trying of "witches," there was placed in the hands of malice and ignorance a power from which no woman, however exalted in rank or pure in character, was secure, provided only she incurred the enmity of someone bent upon effecting her ruin.

The genesis of the belief lies even back of the prevailing superstitions of the times, and is to be found in the lower regard in which the female sex was held. As we have said, chivalry did not cover with its ægis all women, but only those of a certain class; in the Middle Ages, the opinion held of women in general was not flattering to the sex. The descriptions of witch trials and the processes for the extortion of confessions; the indignities of many sorts to which women were subjected; the horrors of a system which virtually made one become an informer upon her neighbor, lest she be anticipated by charges preferred against herself; the whole dreary round of the subject and its literature: all these are too uninviting to permit of detail. It is sufficient for our purpose to say that throughout Europe—for the delusion was so widespread—certainly not less than a million persons were burned, or otherwise put to death, as witches during the Middle Ages. So great a holocaust had to be offered up by women as a sin offering for their sex!

The state of education had much to do with the manners and opinions of the Middle Ages. In the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries there was a feeling of the necessity for extending and improving education. There was spread abroad a degree of popular instruction. It was not an uncommon thing for ladies to be able to read and write. Among the amusements of their leisure hours, reading began to have a very much larger place than formerly. Yet, popular literature—the tales, ballads, and songs—was still communicated orally rather than in writing, though books were more extensively circulated. Often persons of wealth and culture had extensive libraries. Excepting in the case of those who followed or desired to follow the career of scholars, the women were less illiterate than the men.

In considering the dress of the women of England during the Middle Ages, the sumptuary laws passed for its regulation are of interest in themselves as affording a view of the dress of the several classes of society, and they also serve to illustrate upon what simple lines the distinctions of society were drawn.

In the thirty-seventh year of the reign of Edward III., a curious complaint was submitted to Parliament by the Commons against general extravagance in the use of apparel; whereupon an act was passed in regulation of the matter. One of the provisions of this act, as it related to women, prescribed that the wives and children of the grooms and servants of the lords and of tradesmen and artificers should not wear veils costing more than twelvepence each. The wives and children of the tradesmen and artificers themselves should wear no veils excepting those made with thread and manufactured in the kingdom; nor any kind of furs excepting those of lambs, rabbits, cats, and foxes. The cloth for their dresses was also to be of a prescribed kind. The wives and children of esquires—gentlemen under the estate of knighthood—might not wear cloth of gold, of silk, or of silver; nor any ornaments of precious stones, nor furs of any kind; nor any purfling or facings upon their garments; neither should they use esclaires, crinales, or trosles—certain forms of hairpins, and suchlike ornaments.

In the case of knights of a certain income, their wives and children were prohibited from wearing miniver or ermine as linings for their garments or trimming for their sleeves. The lower classes were restricted to blankets and russets for their attire, and these were not to cost more than twelvepence per yard, unless the income of the man was above forty shillings. It is not probable that these enactments were rigidly enforced, and when Henry IV. came to the throne he found it necessary to revive the prohibiting statutes of his predecessor. A number of such sumptuary laws were passed during succeeding reigns, but it is not probable that they were ever really effective. Nor were the satires and witticisms of the poets and other writers of the day more effectual than legislation in correcting the extravagances and vices of dress. Whether the poet or the moralist pointed their shafts against them, the dames and the dandies of the time continued to dress as pleased them.

Some of these criticisms so sum up the dress of the day, that to quote them is to see the fine lady attired in all her bewildering array of beautiful stuffs. William de Lorris, in his celebrated poem, the Romance of the Rose, has drawn the character of Jealousy, and represents him as reproaching his wife for her insatiable love of finery, which, he tells her, is solely to make her attractive in the eyes of her gallants. He then enumerates the parts of her dress, consisting of mantles lined with sable, surcoats, neck linens, wimples, petticoats, shifts, pelices, jewels, chaplets of fresh flowers, buckles of gold, rings, robes, and rich furs. Then he adds: "You carry the worth of one hundred pounds in gold and silver upon your head—such garlands, such coiffures with gilt ribbons, such mirrors framed in gold, so fair, so beautifully polished; such tissues and girdles, with expensive fastenings of gold, set with precious stones of smaller size; and your feet shod so primly, that the robe must be often lifted up to show them." And in a subsequent part of the poem the ladies are advised, satirically, if their ankles be not handsome and their feet small and delicate, to hide them by wearing long robes, trailing upon the pavement. Those, on the contrary, who were more favored in this respect were advised to elevate their robes, as if it were to give access to air, that the passer-by might see and admire their trim feet and ankles.

Such were some of the adornments of the fine ladies of the thirteenth century. It is instructive to turn to Chaucer's Canterbury Tales and study the costumes of some of the characters as they are interpreted by Strutt. This will afford a view of the dress of typical persons in the ordinary ranks of life. The Wife of Bath is drawn by Chaucer at full length as a shameless woman, pert, loquacious, and bold, whose favorite occupation is gossiping and rambling abroad in search of fashionable diversions, in the absence of her husband. She had the art of making fine cloth. Her dress materials were expensive, for she had kerchiefs, or head linen, which she wore on Sunday, so fine that they were equal in value to ten pounds; and her stockings were made of fine red scarlet cloth, and "straightway gartered upon her legs"; her shoes were also new, and to them she had a pair of spurs attached, because she was to ride upon horseback; she wore a hat as broad as a buckler or a target; and she herself informs us that upon holidays she was accustomed to wear gay scarlet gowns.

The Carpenter's Wife, the heroine of the Miller's Tale, has her dress partly described: the collar of her shift was embroidered both before and behind with black silk; her girdle was barred or striped with silk; her apron, bound about her hips, was clean and white, and full of plaits. The tapes of her white headdress were embroidered in the same manner as the collar of her shift; her fillet, or headband, was broad and was made of silk, and "set full high"; probably meaning with a bow or topknot on the upper part of her head. Attached to her girdle was a purse of leather, tasselled or fringed with silk, and ornamented with latoun—a kind of copper alloy of which ornaments were made—in the shape of pearls. She wore a brooch or fibula upon "her low collar," as broad, says the poet, as the boss of a buckler; her shoes "were laced high upon her legs."