måndag 19 november 2018

Wittenberg city church and its paintings.

I visited Wittenberg in may and got surprised, so many fantastic paintings with 16th century clothing! In 1547, the painter Lucas Cranach the elder created the altarpiece for the protestant city church in Wittenberg. Its not only the Church where Luther preached, its also contains important paintings by Cranach. Enjoy!


Central panel - The last supper.


Left panel - Phillip Melanchthon administrated the baptism.


Back of the altar. Love the dresses!

Like this one below, showing women in "kirchgangskleidung" church-clothing, with bundlein, the headwear, and fehenmantel, the coat.
The lady sitting in the front, with the child in red is belived to be Chatarina von Bora and her child with Martin Luther.

The one on the left "Raising of the son of the widow of Nain" by Lucas Cranach the younger in 1569, with widows in bundlein couvering their mouth, a sighn of their grief.

lördag 17 november 2018

The Schaublein - Part 1


In december I will go to Visby for the SCA-Styringheim Luciafeast. It is probably going to be amazing, if I dont freeze, I hate freezing. So, I need a warm outergarment. For women there were several long and short ones to choose from, the "mantel," the "Husecke" and the "Schäublein" the most common ones, in 16th century southern Germany. In Textilier Hausrat Jutta Zandel-Seidel describes all three of them. To choose a type and to find a good pattern I looked at the ones in Drei Schnittbücher. The Janker described there most be what the Textilier hausrat describes as a Husecke, fitted in the shoulders and with hanging sleeves. The schäublein/Schaübel is also described, with a front collar and back yoke. The same garment have many names, depending on dialectal differensies it seems. The schäublein in Drei Schnittbücher, from the Leonfeldner Schnittbuch, is for a bride but I have found a lot of pictures showing exemples of the same garment worn by both the upper and lower classes.



In the painting Gesellenstechen auf dem Nürnberger Hauptmarkt, from 1560 we can see two ladies in one of the corners. One is wearing a husecke and the other is wearing a schaublein.

You can find the painting here: https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geschichte_der_Stadt_N%C3%BCrnberg#/media/File:N%C3%BCrnbergerGesellenstechen1561L1070615_(2).jpg

And in Hans Weigels costume book, plate 21, I found what I wanted, a Nuremberg woman in weekday dress with a short-trimmed cloak. It looks the same as the Gepratüt ein Schaübel, Brides little schaube, the pattern in Drei Schnittbücher. So that is what Im going to use. Wish me luck!




fredag 16 november 2018

Wulsthaube, steuchlein and other German headwear.

For a joined lecture with Renike at the Drachenwald Kingdom university 9-11 november 2018 at Ingestre Hall I desided to learn more about headwear in southern Germany. The timeperiod Im most interested in is 1500-1550 so that was my timelimit. I put togheter a lecture and was not satisfied, I also needed to try to make examples of the ones I was talking about.
The medieval tradition of covering the hair with a haube, a hood, as a sign of marital status continued during the 16th century. Tailors sewed clothes for both men and women until the late 1600s when women began to take over the sewing of women's clothes. However, women's work has always included the manufacture of linen clothing to meet the needs of their own family. This was done within the walls of the home.
There is a lot of headwear in different shapes to see in portraits. However, there are not as many to find in laundry descriptions and inventories. Neither do we have preserved garments to look at when it comes to German headwear. Pattern books do not contain patterns for this type of garment just because they are sewn within the walls of the home. Purchase and maintenance of linen was always a major expense item in a household budget. Linen and linen/cotton-blends accounted for the most common materials in headgear for all classes of society.
The project inkluded examples of the most common ones. There are a lot of different variants and they are all, more or less, used during the entire timeperiod.
Wulsthaube mit schleier
The most common one is the wulsthaube with a veil, and later on a haube. The complete headdress consisted of an under coif/cap (Unterhaube) and a veil, which was likely known as the Steuchlein, and it is the most frequently mentioned headdress in the clothing inventories through all the social classes in 16th century Germany. It will beat all other in the number found in inventory and also in paintings. Wulst, wulsthaube and stucklein all appear separately in the inventories, so its likely they could be taken apart and maybe used togheter with other garments. Wulsthaube was a roll cap, a hood with a wulst attatched to it some how. The wulst is the loose roll. But there are no items left to look at so we dont know for sure how they are made.
In the first years of the 16th century the wulst is large in size. I tried to make a really big wulst but when it was done it was still a bit small. I chose to make small stiches in the cap to make the wulst stay in place. In the pictures I use the big wulsthaube with a schleier, a thicker veil in linen, and one I wraped as what is usually called a Bundlein. 



Picture above: https://www.pinterest.de/pin/449867450274288923/
Picture below: https://www.pinterest.de/pin/449867450274463461/







The fashionable development of the headwear in the 16th century saw a reduction in size. The portrait now shows a lighter, more free way of wearing the headwear. Almost all women had, in addition to a simple plain veil, a decorated one. The wulst is getting smaller, in the first decade of the 16th century, but keep its round shape on the back of the head. The design and decorations showed which social class the woman was in. The upper class could be richly decorated with, for example, silk or gold thread or embroderies. The sumptuary laws regulated who had the right to wear what when it comes to fine materials and decorations. My steuchlein consist of a veil in very fine wool, but this can also be in linen, and the wulsthaube is made with a linen cap and a stuffed role.



Picture above: https://www.pinterest.de/pin/449867450274925880/








Except the changing in size the wulst also starts to lean a bit backwards. The design will be more fancy and the face-framing effect will increase with embroderies. Embroidered and woven decorative bands are pinched or sewn to the front ends.
Picture: https://www.pinterest.de/pin/449867450274330373/

When I made my example I chose to make it in five picecs. A small wulst, a haube, a linen band, an embrodiered picece and a silk gace covering all of it. If you want, very common in the paintings, you can use a embroderie as a decoration. More common to use that then not to. The wulst is made with wire and linen, the haube also in linen.

The shape of the haube, enlarging the back of the head, has given the characteristic appearance of steuchlein, schleier and bundlein, the characteristick appearance of the german 16th century woman really.


Information comes from:
Textiler Hausrat Jutta Zander-Seidel
Patterns of fashion nr 4 Janet Arnold

In Mode - Kleider und Bilder aus Renaissance und Frühbarock Jutta Zander-Seidel

Drei Schnittbücher Katherine Barich/Marion McNealy

First thing I had to say.


I started my own blogg! Just like everybody else...so why did I? To have a place where I could present my research, my thoughts and my results. I have been activ in the Sociaty for creativ anacronism for ten years and it is time to start sewing with research, to do it as correct as possible.