PUNCH’S BOOK OF BRITISH COSTUMES.
CHAPTER III. – THE ANGLO-SAXON PERIOD.
ot because this is leap year, we may make a leap here over the Anglo-Roman period, but because there is but little change of costume to record it. The only noticeable novelty which Tacitus relates was, that the better classes mostly “threw away their braccæ,” and wore the Roman tunic, which descended to the knee. Scotch writers have however discredited this statement, as it tends to bring discredit on the prudence of their ancestors. It seems indeed incredible that any forefather of Scotchmen could have ever been so wasteful as to throw away his breeches, and we think it far more likely that the better classes either gave away their cast-off clothing or else let their servants sell it for them to the Jews. Even in our present extravagance of dress, it is seldom that one hears of swells throwing away their trousers; and we imagine when the braccæ first went out of fashion there were many ways of turning them to profitable account. Poor relations were, no doubt, very thankful to get hold of them; and we can fancy the delight of a Roman-British matron at finding an old pair of braccæ in a closet, and exchanging them forthwith to some Roman-British costermonger, for a “hornament to her fire-stove” or a “bowl of ‘andsome gold-fish.”
We proceed now to a period of which the costumes have been much more frequently depicted, and we have not to draw so largely on our fancy to describe them. When the reader bears in mind that it was in the Anglo-Saxon time that Harold lived and died, we need surely say no more to convince him on this point. Every student of High Art has dressed up a lay figure to represent how Harold lay upon the field, and from the various costumes in which his body has been found, we may arrive at something possibly approaching to the truth.
Hasty critics might imagine that the Battle of Hastings would not afford much notion of the fashions of the period, any more than in a picture of the Battle of Waterloo one would expect to see the pantaloons and pumps then worn at Almack’s. But of the Saxons we are told that nearly all of them were soldiers, and they were therefore much more military than civil in their habits. The great guns of historians cite the Canons of King Edgar, which enjoined, as a great penance, that men should go unarmed; and from this we may infer that the male part of the people went about in mail, and used their spear or sword by way of walking-stick or switch. The addition of a shield to their ordinary clothing would make them just as ready for the fray as for the feast; and as the latter very often ended in the former, we can fancy that they sometimes armed themselves with dish-covers, which now bear a close resemblance to the Saxon shield.
It would indeed seem from the dresses of these ancestors of ours, that their organs of Destructiveness were most prodigiously developed, or else their bumps of Cautiousness were most unusually big. “Every man his own policeman” was apparently their motto, and one would think the Daughter-signal always stared them in the face. As a proof of their pugnacity we learn, that they preferred to wear a shortened tunic, “because in it they could most freely wield their weapons;” and they added to this vestment a metal rim or collar, which at times when they grew mettlesome, served by way of breast-piece. This pectoral was no doubt a great protection to the chest, and shielded it from cold as well as from a sword-cut. Besides being a breast-plate, it acted, we do not doubt a great protection to the chest, and shielded it from cold as well as from a sword-cut. Besides being a breast-plate, it acted, we do not doubt, as a sort of poor man’s plaister, and saved the wearers from bronchitis not less than from a blow.
To protect themselves still further, both from cutting winds and weapons, the Saxons wore a kind of ringed tunic, or byrne: so called, perhaps, because it was exceedingly warm clothing, and very likely made the wearers burning hot. The imaginative reader may form some faint conception of the nature of this byrne, by reading an enigma which was made by Bishop Adhelm, and which, as being a fair specimen of the riddles of the period, it may not be out of place to copy into Punch.
“I was produced” – says the bishop, speaking as the byrne -
“I was produced in the cold bowels of the dewy earth, and not made from the rough fleeces of wool: no woofs drew me, nor at my birth did the tremulous threads resound; the yellow down of silkworms formed me not; I passed not through the shuttle, neither was I stricken with the wool-comb; yet, strange to say, in common discourse I am called a garment. I fear not the darts taken from the long quivers.”
Serious people may be shocked at finding that a Bishop has stooped to make a riddle, but this episcopal enigma may serve to shut their mouths, when they protest that riddle-making is a frivolous employment, which no one but a punster or a pickpocket would take to. It cannot be denied that the enigma is far-fetched, considering the long distant date from which we fetch it. Still, for such an early effort, it is really not so bad, and we think none the worse of the good bishop for making it.
Whether or no the Scalds were the the inventors of the byrne, is a question far more easy to be asked than to be answered. It seems however not unreasonable to fancy that they were, for the byrne was just the thing for fiery people like the Scalds, who were so continually getting into hot water. Being, as we learn, extremely difficult to pierce, it was doubtless of great use in what the Yankees call a “difficulty.” At the time of which we write the thoughtful reader may remember that revolvers were not known: and, as duels then were fought with daggers, spears, and swords, the byrne, there is no question, often saved the skins of those who came up to the scratch.
The Anglo-Saxon shields were oval and convex, with an iron boss, or umbo, projeeting from the centre like the handle of a dish-cover; to which, as we have said, the shields bore somewhat of resemblance. But though they looked like discovers, their chief use was as head-covers: and we have no doubt they were useful in peace as well as war-time, and could ward not only weapons but water from the brain. Their projecting umbo gave them quite the look of umbo-rellas, and they were doubtless of good service in a shower or a scrimmage, and could protect the head from anything, whether wet or blows, which happened to be rained on it.
These dish-covers, however, were not their only brain-covers; for, as the sapient observer has possibly remarked, men don’t wear an umbrella with a view to keep their heads warm. So besides their shields the Saxons wore by day a sort of night-cap, which a modern writer tells us was “borrowed from the Phrygians.” We think thought, that this writer writes wrongly on this head; for we can’t believe our ancestors were so hard up for hats, that they were forced to go so far as Phrygia to borrow them. The old illuminations throw some light upon this cap, which seems in shape to have been a cross between a nightcap and a foolscap. In material, however, it differed from them both, being made of leather, which was sometimes edged with metal: so that, at least in one material respect, this queer cap bore resemblance to the French chapeau de cuir.
Back to A COOL QUESTION AND A COURTEOUS ANSWER. <<< — >>> Next to NOTES ON NAPLES.
