Que produisent tous les pays."
Le Palais des Dentelles (Rothomago).
Lace[[77]] is defined as a plain or ornamental network, wrought of fine threads of gold, silver, silk, flax, or cotton, interwoven, to which may be added "poil de chèvre," and also the fibre of the aloe, employed by the peasants of Italy and Spain. The term lacez rendered in the English translation of the Statutes[[78]] as "laces," implying braids, such as were used for uniting the different parts of the dress, appears long before lace, properly so called, came into use. The earlier laces, such as they were, were defined by the word "passament"[[79]]—a general term for gimps and braids, as well as for lace. Modern industry has separated these two classes of work, but their being formerly so confounded renders it difficult in historic researches to separate one from the other.
The same confusion occurs in France, where the first lace was called passement, because it was applied to the same use, to braid or lay flat over the coats and other garments. The lace trade was entirely in the hands of the "passementiers" of Paris, who were allowed to make all sorts of "passements de dentelle sur l'oreiller aux fuseaux, aux épingles, et à la main, d'or, d'argent, tant fin que faux, de soye, de fil blanc, et de couleur," etc. They therefore applied the same terms to their different products, whatever the material.
The word passement continued to be in use till the middle of the seventeenth century, it being specified as "passements aux fuseaux," "passements à l'aiguille"; only it was more specifically applied to lace without an edge.
The term dentelle is also of modern date, nor will it be found in the earlier French dictionaries.[[80]] It was not till fashion caused the passament to be made with a toothed edge that the expression of "passement dentelé" first appears.
In the accounts of Henry II. of France, and his queen, we have frequent notices of "passement jaulne dantellé des deux costez,"[[81]] "passement de soye incarnat dentellé d'un costé,"[[82]] etc., etc., but no mention of the word "dentelle." It does, however, occur in an inventory of an earlier date, that of Marguerite de France, sister of Francis I., who, in 1545, paid the sum of VI. livres "pour soixante aulnes, fine dantelle de Florance pour mettre à des colletz."[[83]]
After a lapse of twenty years and more, among the articles furnished to Mary Stuart in 1567, is "Une pacque de petite dentelle";[[84]] and this is the sole mention of the word in all her accounts.
We find like entries in the accounts of Henry IV.'s first queen.[[85]]
Gradually the passement dentelé subsided into the modern dentelle.