6.—[Page 124.]
The particulars of female costume mentioned in the text are taken from a very valuable and curious chronicle, printed by Muratori in the 16th vol. of his collection. See Rer. Ital. Scrip. T. 16. p. 50 et seq. It is the Chronicon Placentinum by Johannes de Mussis, citizen of Placentia. He is a vehement laudator temporis acti; and laments the degeneracy and increasing luxury of his day in the well known tone of the moralists of any age. The passage is so curious that I am tempted to translate a considerable portion for the amusement of those who are not likely to seek the original in the vast treasure-house of Muratori.
"In the good old time," says John de Mussis, "man and wife at supper eat out of one dish. The use of carved wooden utensils at table was unknown. One or two cups for drinking served the whole family. Those who supped at night lighted the table with torches held in the hand of a boy or servant; for candles of tallow or of wax were not in use. The men wore cloaks of skin, or of wool, or of hemp. Women at their marriage wore tunics of hemp. Coarse were then the fashions both for men and women. Of gold or silver little or none was seen in the dress. There was no luxury in food. Men of the people eat fresh meat thrice a-week. Then for dinner they eat herbs and garden produce, which had been boiled with the meat; and made their supper of the meat put by for that purpose. The use of wine in the summer was not general. Men deemed themselves rich with a small amount of money. Small were the cellars in those days; and the larders no bigger. Women were content to marry with a small dower, because their mode of life was excessively frugal. Virgins before their marriage were content with a hempen tunic, which was called a 'sotana,' (the modern Italian word for a petticoat) and a linen[216] garment called a 'socca.' Virgins wore no costly head-dresses. Matrons bound their temples, cheeks, and chin with broad fillets. * * * * Now the old customs are superseded by many indecorous usages. But especially for the destruction of souls has parsimony been changed for luxury. Clothes are seen of exquisite material and workmanship, and ornamented to excess. We have silver and gold and pearls in cunning devices; fringes of wonderful breadth, linings of silk varied with foreign and costly skins. Incitements to gluttony are not wanting. Foreign wines are drunk. Drinking is almost universal. Sumptuous dishes are publicly used. Cooks are held in high honour. Every sort of provocative to gluttony and greed is in request. And avarice is called into play for the purpose of supplying the means for all this. Hence come usury, frauds, rapaciousness, robbery, exiles, domestic broils, unlawful profits, oppression of the innocent, the extermination of families, and banishment of the rich. We say 'our God is our belly,' We return to the pomps which we have renounced in our baptism, and are deserters from God to the devil. And were it not that the clergy edify us by their pure examples, there would soon be no limit to our luxury and ambition. * * * * Our ladies wear long and large robes of crimson silk velvet, or of cloth of silk, brocaded with gold, or of cloth of gold, or of simple cloth of silk, of cloth of scarlet or crimson wool, or other costly cloths. And these cloths of purple stuff, or of velvet, or of cloth of gold or brocade cost for a mantle or gown from 25 up to 40 golden florins or ducats. * * * * And on some of these dresses there are large and deep fringes of gold around the collar, which encircles the throat, for all the world like the spiked collar round the neck of a dog. On others there are put from three to five ounces of pearls, worth ten golden florins an ounce. And they wear small hoods with large golden fringes, or with rows of pearls around the said hoods. And they go girt about the waist with handsome girdles of gilt silver, or of pearls, worth about 25 golden florins the girdle. Sometimes no girdle is worn. And every lady has trinkets of gold and precious stones to the value of from 30 to 50 golden florins.
"Some, however, of these dresses are decorous, because they do not expose the bosom. But they have other indecent dresses, which are called Ciprians; these are made extremely large towards the feet, and close-fitting from the waist upwards, with long and large sleeves, like those described above. They are of similar cost also, and are adorned with jewels of equal value. And they are ornamented in front, from the neck to the feet, with bosses of silver-gilt or of pearls. And these Ciprians have the opening around the neck so large that they show the bosom, et videtur, quod dictæ mamillæ velint exire de sinu earum. Which dresses would be magnificent, if they did not expose the bosom, and if the collar was so decently close that at least the breast should not be visible to every body. These ladies also wear in their head-dresses jewels of great price. For instance, some wear coronets of silver-gilt, or of pure gold, adorned with pearls and precious stones, to the value of from 70 to 100 golden florins. And others wear 'terzollas' of large pearls, worth from 100 to 125 golden florins. Which 'terzollas' are so called, because they are made of 300 great pearls, and because they are made and ranged in three tiers. These ladies, too, in the place of the chaplets of gold or of silk, which they used to wear twined in the hair of their head, now wear supports for the hair, 'bugulos,' as they are called, which they cover with their hair tied over the said 'bugulos,' with braiding of silk or of gold, or with silver braiding covered with pearls."
The chronicler then describes the dress of grave matrons and that of widows. The fashions of the young men give as much, or more, offence to the writer as those of the ladies, for reasons, which the curious must seek in the very plain speaking and exceedingly barbarous Latin of John de Mussis' own pages.
One or two other particulars, however, are worth noting. All persons of both sexes, both in summer and in winter, wear shoes, and sometimes hose with soles, or shoes having points three inches long beyond the feet. Ladies and young men wear chains of silver-gilt, or pearls or coral, around their necks. The said youths—these exquisites of Placentia, who have been dust these four hundred years—used to shave their beard, and their hair below the ears, wearing it above that line frizzed and puffed out to as large a circumference as possible. "And some keep one horse, and some two, and some five, et aliqui nullum tenent,"—which naïf-ly lame conclusion puts one in mind of the French bard's description of Marlborough's funeral cortège:
"L'un portait se cuirasse;—L'autre son bouclier;
L'un portait son grand sabre;—L'autre ne portait rien!"
The Placentian youths, who kept horses, our author goes on to tell us, kept grooms also, whose wages were twelve golden florins a-year. Maid-servants had seven golden florins and their food, but not their clothes.
The citizens, too, we are told, make very good cheer. At festivals, especially at marriage feasts, they drink good wine, both white and red. The beginning of the banquet always consists of confections of sugar. The first course is generally formed of one or two capons, and "on each trencher a large piece of meat stewed with almonds and sugar, and spices and other good things." Then boiled meat is served "in magnâ quantitate;" capons, chickens, pheasants, partridges, hares, wild boars, kids, and other meat, according to the time of year. After that, tarts and cakes, with spun sugar on them, are set forth. A copious description of supper, as distinguished from dinner, follows, in which the principal peculiarity seems to be the prevalence of various meats in the form of "gelatine." Supper always ends with fruit,—written always "fluges," indicating a mode of pronunciation still common among the Italian peasantry, who, to the present day, rhyme "molta" to "porta." After the "fluges" comes the following conclusion, several times repeated by the methodical old chronicler, in the same words: "Et post lotis manibus, antequam tabulæ levantur, dant bibere, et confectum zuchari, et post bibere." In Lent they begin with the same formulary, minus the hand-washing; then come figs and peeled almonds; then large fishes, "à la poivrade,"—"ad piperatum;" then rice soup with milk of almonds, and sugar and spices, and salted eels. After these, boiled pike are served with vinegar sauce, or mustard sauce, or cooked with wine and spices. Then nuts and other fruit; to end with "Et post lotis manibus," &c., da capo.