The Fashion Historian

Pomegranate illustration from Dr. Otto Wilhelm Thomé's Flora von Deutschland, Österreich und der Schweiz, 1885. Image from http://www.biolib.de/.

The pomegranate (Punica granatum) is a fruit-bearing shrub, originating from the Middle East and Mediterranean Basin. Throughout history, the pomegranate tree has been used for a variety of purposes. It's bark has been used to cure leather, it's rind and flowers have been used as textile dye, and it's fruit has been prized for its delicious taste and medicinal properties. Images of the pomegranate have permeated visual culture since ancient times. In Ancient Greek mythology, for example, the pomegranate was the food eaten by the dead in the underworld. In the world of fashion history, the pomegranate has had an extraordinary impact on textiles.

Silk from the 15th or 16th century. Museo Civico d'Arte Antica.

This textile shows the so-called "pomegranate motif". This stylized design of a central floral image surrounded by wavy stems has its origins in the Ottoman Empire. Under the reign of Süleyman I, also known as Süleyman the Magnificent (r. 1520-66), the arts flourished, and the textile design of a flowering plant such as carnations, blooming palmettes or pomegranates surrounded by a lattice pattern became extremely popular. These textiles made their way across trade routs to Western Europe where they were prized for their elegant patterns and luxurious materials. These motifs were also adopted by Western European artisans, and dominate textile design of the Renaissance.

Length of brocaded velvet, late 15th century, Italian (Venice). The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Today, it's hard to understand the extreme value textiles held in the centuries before mass mechanized production. Of course in the pre-industrial period, everything was made by hand. Creating textiles with complex designs such as the pomegranate motif took an enormous amount time and incredibly skilled artisans. Furthermore, the rich colors and expensive materials present in many surviving textiles with the pomegranate motif added additional cost. Red and black dyes were among the most expensive dyes on the market. And many textiles incorporated metal-wrapped threads. To create metal-wrapped threads, thin strips of actual gold or silver would be wrapped around a strand of thread (usually silk). When this thread was woven into a fabric, the resulting textile would literally be made of silver or gold. The above textile is a silk velvet with metal-wrapped threads. The rich red color, complex pattern, and use of metal threads would have made this piece extraordinarily expensive.

Portrait of Eleanor of Toledo and her son Giovanni, by Bronzino, c. 1514. The Uffizi.

Textiles were among the most expensive items a person could buy. Textiles with the pomegranate motif were used for clothing (as can be seen in the portraits above and below), furnishing, and ecclesiastical garments. When looking at the art of the period, textiles with the pomegranate motif show up in a large number of portraits and religious art. Their use was not just because the textiles provide a visually interesting pattern. As this post shows, the use of these textiles was also a potent expression of wealth and power.

Portrait of a Girl, by Antonio del Pollaiuolo, c. 1460-65. Gemäldegalerie, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin.

Furthermore, the prevalence of the pomegranate motif in visual culture attests to the connections between cultures all over the globe. Too often people tend to think of the Middle Ages and the Renaissance as a time when cultures were isolated, and global interactions were not present. But the pomegranate motif is just one piece of evidence that proves that a global exchange of ideas and cultures was alive and well.

When some one says medieval fashion, one of the first thoughts that come to mind is the tall cone shaped hats worn by little girls pretending to be princesses everywhere. But what were these hats actually called and when were the actually worn?


Detail from Presentation of Christ at the Temple by Hans Holbein the Elder, 1500-1501

Princess Hats aka henin appeared in the mid to late fifteenth century, when height began to replace width as the dominant feature of womens headwear. Henin were a continental trend, originating in Burgundy, and it is unlikely that they were ever worn in England. The henin appeared during the period when the gothic style still dominated architecture, and may be a reflection of the tall spires reaching towards heaven.


Chartres Cathedral.

The henin was worn with a veil called a cointoise, which was either attached to the point of the cone or swathed around it. The cointoise could vary in length, reaching anywhere from the shoulders to the hemline of the dress. It's not exactly clear how a henin stayed on a womans head. They feature a small v-shaped loop in front, called a frontlet, which may provide some anchorage. Others have suggested that a small bit of glue was put on the frontlet to attach it to the forehead. An extremely high hairline was considered beautiful in this period, and the henin allowed women to show off their prominent foreheads.


Image from Mary of Burgundy's Book of Hours, 1467-1480.

Naturally the henin took a great amount of abuse. Pierre de Gros said in Le Jardin des Nobles that "the younger and more beauitufl the ladies were, the higher were the chimneys that they carried."

Oh, times are tough in the middle ages. All the decent young men are fighting in crusades or dying of plague. I mean what's a girl got to do to get a date? Bend over backwards?



Well... yes, actually. BUH DUM CHING!!!!

As the Black Plague killed off millions and millions of people, those remaining alive had the task of repopulation. Thus to be fertile was to be beautiful. To project her fertility, a lady would bend back and stick our her abdomen, mimicking how it looks to be pregnant. This body posture has been called the gothic slouch.



Even as the plague finished doing what it does best, the fertile look continued to be popular.



Here is the famous Arnolfini Wedding Portrait from the 15th century. The woman in the portrait isn't pregnant, but she is holding up some of the extra fabric in her dress to simulate a pregnant belly, symbolizing that she is fertile and will soon give her new husband many sons who will carry on the grand Arnolfini pimp-hat-wearing tradition.

In an age where life expectancy was extremely short and most of your children would die before adulthood, the best thing a woman could be was very fertile. Marriages weren't necessarily about finding some one you love or vaguely get along with, although that was great if that happened. Marriage was most importantly about procreation. The family name had to be carried on, and that meant at least one son who lived to adulthood and had children of his own. That also meant surviving multiple pregnancies (even just having the child could very easily kill you), and your chances of survival would be greater if there was more fat around your lower body. By sticking out your abdomen, you give the illusion of a plump lower body which will help you survive many childbirths.

Compare this to today, where any sign of belly fat is abhorred. With the improvement of medical technology, childbirth is not nearly as dangerous and most children live into adulthood. Therefore a woman does not need to show that she has enough belly fat to survive childbirth, because these days she doesn't need that. And because weight doesn't have as much effect over the ability to survive multiple childbirths, signs of fertility are not tied up in how much belly fat a woman has. Furthermore, many couples choose not to have any children at all, society having developed to a point where having many children is no longer an absolute requirement (mothers desiring grandchildren, however, are another matter entirely). Marriage has become mainly about finding some one you love. So now the ideal for a woman is to stand up straight and suck it in. Unless you're Paris Hilton. She doesn't have bad posture, she's just trying to bring back the gothic slouch!