quote:

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Originally posted by Nikki:
I would like to use the fabric for a gown, but want to avoid any issues regarding use of dyes by various classes, or whatnot.

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Traditionally yellow does not appear to have been a 'favoured' colour but weld (which yields a sharp yellow) was one of the big 3 dyes (woad, madder & weld) but appears to have been used principally as a means of achieving a wider pallete rather than for the colour itself .. e.g. greens.

One suggestion is that it was associated with the Jews and therefore shunned by Christians at the time. Indeeed some illustrations of hypocrites etc. show yellow hats.

A C16th/C17th song 'Yellow Hose' associates yellow hose with bachelorhood ... maybe the reason for Shakespere's yellow hose cross gartered in (ahh !!! forgotten the play ... 12th night maybe ???) So but the C16th it does certainly appear in clothing but not commonly.

From all of the inventories I've looked through I can't particularly recall many/any yellow ... lots of reds, greens, blues, greys, blacks etc.

Sorry that's not really what you wanted to hear is it ...

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Thanks for the reminder ... interesting that a bachelor had yellow hose ... maybe the tradition was older than I thought ... or maybe it's just a coincidence ???

I just pulled this from the CoSG list.

quote:

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Helen Castor: Blood and Roses. The Paston family and the Wars of
the Roses. London 2004.

The Paston letters cover 80 years of English history and are the
biggest corpus of 15th letters in England. Helen Castor used
them to write the biography of three generation of Pastons,
presenting thrilling insights into the struggle of men trying
to raise their status. It made me realize what the medieval
symbol "fortune's wheel" really means.

Just one excerpt to water your mouths:

"[Edmund ...] did not allow his financial straits to compromise
his exuberant taste in clothes. He included a lengthy shopping
list in his letter to John III, who was staying in
the capital for a few weeks: three yards of purple camlet -
a lightweight cloth - at four shillings a yard; a 'bonnet of
deep mulberry' for two shillings and fourpence; woolen cloth,
in yellow, to make a pair of hose; a belt made out of ribbon
in a grey-blue colour known as 'plunket'; three dozen 'points'
- laces by which hose were tied on to other garments at the waist
to prevent them falling down - in white, red and yellow; and three pairs
of pattens, wooden overshoes worn to raise the wearer's feet above the
mud and refuse in the streets." [H. Castor, Blood and Roses, p. 241]

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Of particular note, yellow cloth, and colored laces.

Jenn

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quote:

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Originally posted by Fire Stryker:
Hey all,

I just pulled this from the CoSG list.

Of particular note, yellow cloth, and colored laces.

Jenn

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and colored laces.

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Anyway, back to yellow hose.

I think Nikki's original question was about gold and yellow fabric for garments in general, because there was a bolt of some nice wool available.
J

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