As bearing on the conservatism of the Church in matters of dress, we may mention that in Holland, until recent times, the clergy wore a very old-fashioned dress, or perhaps it may better be described as a picturesque uniform, consisting of an old three-cornered hat, and a coat resembling the ordinary evening dress-coat, having a long pleated strip called “the mantle” hooked on the neck, and obviously being a survival from an early and more ample gown of some kind. They wore knee-breeches buckled at the knees, and buckled shoes, but this costume was only used when the minister was officiating at service.
Some of the heads of the churches in Scotland still adopt a kind of Court dress.
In turning for a moment again to the everyday dress of the clergy, the method of fastening the characteristic white choker at the back seems to have come from the bands. Thackeray in “The Newcomes” uses the name choker as meaning a white necktie, and it was also applied to the old leather stocks which the clerical collar, in its stiffness, resembles. The bishop’s hat we have already alluded to, as showing the stage in a process of cocking, the brim being tied to the crown by strings. The clerical gaiters we can derive from the old episcopal buskins, while the apron appears to be a vestige of the cassock to which we have before referred.
The dress of monks usually consists of a tunic or closed gown and scapular, while there may be one or more open gowns with a hood at the back.
Nuns or Sisters of Mercy are so commonly seen in our streets, and they do so much for the benefit of the poor, and take such a part in educational matters, that their dress is very familiar to us. It is difficult to say how old it may not be, and though stiff hoods similar to those which are now in use by nuns were adopted by women generally in Tudor times, we find in the head-dress of Henry II’s reign the counterpart of the linen bands which surround the face and hide the hair. The other garments of nuns may have the same origin as ecclesiastical vestments, for the dress of the Roman women was very much like that of the men. (See Figures [128] and [131]-[133].)
There are, of course, many orders, congregations, and communities of nuns, but we may describe the dress of one of the latter, and then make a few additional remarks. In the case of the Kilburn Sisters of the Church, who are English Catholics—but who have dedicated their lives to religion in the same way as the Roman Catholic nuns—the indoor dress consists of a white cap, the descendant of the Norman chin-band, which fits tightly round the head—as the hair of all nuns is, of course, cut close—and it is gathered round the face with a string. This cap, if it comes down low on the forehead, correspondingly covers the chin, but in many cases the latter is free. Over the white cap in indoor dress a black veil is worn in the case of professed nuns, a blue veil by novices, while postulants, who may be taken as corresponding to probationers in a hospital, wear only a cap, though in chapel they have a white veil as well. Round the neck of the Sister is a white collar, which in this case is separate from the cap and buttons on to it at one side.
This collar, which like the veil may be traced to the wimple of Norman and later ladies, is also called a breast cloth or a gremial, and may be, as we have indicated, made in one piece with the cap.
In outdoor dress a stiff white hood is placed over the indoor head-dress, and over that again comes the outdoor black veil.
It should be mentioned that the Kilburn Sisters now pin their veils to the sides of their linen caps in exactly the same way that the dame in the time of the early Plantagenets did her wimple to the sides of her chin-band.