- Farthingale
Farthingale is a term applied to any of several structures used under Western
Europe an women'sclothing in the late fifteenth and sixteenth centuries to support the skirts into the desired shape.Spanish farthingale
The Spanish farthingale was a
hoop skirt . Originally stiffened with the subtropical Giant Reed, later designs in the temperate climate zone were stiffened with osiers (willow cuttings),rope , or (from about 1580) whalebone. The name comes from Spanish "verdugo" 'green wood', because the dying stems of Giant Reed are rigid.The earliest sources indicate that Princess Juana of
Portugal used "verdugadas" with hoops inSpain to possibly cover up an unwanted and indiscreet (maybe not her husbands child) pregnancy (1460's - 1470's). Court fashion followed suit. The earliest images of Spanish farthingales show hoops prominently displayed on the outer surfaces of skirts, although later they merely provided shape to the overskirt. The Spanish princessCatherine of Aragon brought the fashion into England on her marriage to Prince Arthur, eldest son of Henry VII in 1501.Spanish farthingales were an essential element of Tudor fashion in England, and remained a fixture of conservative Spanish court fashion into the early seventeenth century (see Portrait of Queen Margaret of Austria, 1609).
French farthingale
The French farthingale or "vertugadin" is properly a crescent- or sausage-shaped pad stiffened with bent or whalebone and tied around the waist under the skirts; the resulting silhouette is broad and rounded over the hips with the skirt hanging freely in folds.
This type of French farthingale seems to be the item called a "roll" in Elizabeth I's wardobe accounts. It is the origin of the "bumroll" worn by Elizabethan recreationists.
The term "French farthingale" is also used for the "wheel" or "drum farthingale", a stiffened circular support for the drum-shaped silhouette worn at the English court from the 1590s to c. 1620.
The farthingale is the ancestor of
eighteenth century panniers and of thenineteenth century crinoline .See also
*
1500-1550 in fashion
*1550-1600 in fashion
*1600-1650 in fashion External links
* [http://modehistorique.com/elizabethan/farthingales.html Farthingales and Bumrolls]
References
*Anderson, Ruth Matilda: "Hispanic Costume 1480-1530", The Hispanic Society of America, New York 1979. ISBN 0-8753-5126-3
*Arnold, Janet: "Patterns of Fashion: the cut and construction of clothes for men and women 1560-1620", Macmillan 1985. Revised edition 1986. ISBN 0-89676-083-9
*Arnold, Janet: "Queen Elizabeth's Wardrobe Unlock'd", W S Maney and Son Ltd, Leeds 1988. ISBN 0-901286-20-6
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