ce the blending of the Roman with the barbaric
costume--namely, the combination of the long, shapeless garment with that
which was worn by the Germans, and which was accompanied by tight-fitting
braies. Thus, in the recumbent statue which adorned the tomb of Clovis, in
the Church of the Abbey of St. Genevieve, the King is represented as
wearing the _tunic_ and the _toga_, but, in addition, Gallo-Roman
civilization had actually given him tight-fitting braies, somewhat similar
to what we now call pantaloons. Besides this, his tunic is fastened by a
belt; which, however, was not a novelty in his time, for the women then
wore long dresses, fastened at the waist by a girdle. There is nothing
very remarkable about his shoes, since we find that the shoe, or closed
sandal, was worn from the remotest periods by nearly all nations (Figs.
402 and 403).

[Illustration: Fig. 402.--Costume of King Clovis (Sixth Century).--From a
Statue on his Tomb, formerly in the Abbey of St. Genevieve.]

[Illustration: Fig. 403.--Costume of King Childebert (Seventh
Century).--From a Statue formerly placed in the Refectory of the Abbey of
St. Germain-des-Pres.]

The cloak claims an equally ancient origin. The principal thing worthy of
notice is the amount of ornament with which the Franks enriched their
girdles and the borders of their tunics and cloaks. This fashion they
borrowed from the Imperial court, which, having been transferred from Rome
to Constantinople during the third century, was not slow to adopt the
luxury of precious stones and other rich decorations commonly in use
amongst Eastern nations. Following the example of Horace de Vielcastel,
the learned author of a history of the costumes of France, we may here
state that it is very difficult, if not impossible, to define the exact
costume during the time of the early Merovingian periods. The first
writers who have touched upon this subject have spoken of it very vaguely,
or not being contemporaries of the times of which they wrote, could only
describe from tradition or hearsay. Those monuments in which early costume
is supposed to be represented are almost all of later date, when artists,
whether sculptors or painters, were not very exact in their delineations
of costume, and even seemed to imagine that no other style could have
existed before their time than the one with which they were daily
familiar. In order to be as accurate as possible, although, after all, we
can only speak hypo