omed to Shakespeare put on the stage in elaborate dresses that
one imagines, or one is apt to imagine, that there is a warrant for
some of the dresses in the plays. In some cases he confounds the
producer and the illustrator by introducing garments of his own date
into historical plays, as, for example, Coriolanus. Here are the
clothes allusions in that play:

'When you cast your stinking greasy caps,
You have made good work,
You and your apron-men.'

'Go to them with this bonnet in your hand.'

'Enter Coriolanus in a gown of humility.'

'Matrons fling gloves, ladies and maids their scarfs and
handkerchers.'

'The kitchen malkin pins her richest lockram[A] 'bout
her reechy neck.'

[A] 'Lockram' is coarse linen.

'Our veiled dames.'

'Commit the war of white and damask in their nicely
gawded cheeks to the wanton and spoil of Phoebus'
burning kisses.'

'Doublets that hangmen would bury with these that wore
them.'

I have not kept the lines in verse, but in a convenient way to show
their allusions.

In 'Pericles' we have mention of ruffs and bases. Pericles says:

'I am provided of a pair of bases.'

Certainly the bases might be made to appear Roman, if one accepts the
long slips of cloth or leather in Roman military dress as being
bases; but Shakespeare is really--as in the case of the
ruffs--alluding to the petticoats of the doublet of his time worn by
grave persons. Bases also apply to silk hose.

In 'Titus Andronicus' we have:

'An idiot holds his bauble for his God.'

Julius Caesar is mentioned as an Elizabethan:

'He plucked ope his doublet.'

The Carpenter in 'Julius Caesar' is asked:

'Where is thy leather apron and thy rule?'

The mob have 'sweaty night-caps.'

Cleopatra, in 'Antony and Cleopatra,' says:

'I'll give thee an armour all of gold.'

The 'Winter's Tale,' the action of which occurs in Pagan times, is
full of anachronisms. As, for instance, Whitsun pastorals, Christian
burial, an Emperor of Russia, and an Italian fifteenth-century
painter. Also:

'Lawn as white as driven snow;
Cyprus[B] black as ere was crow;
Gloves as sweet as damask roses;
Masks for faces and for noses;
Bugle-bracelet, necklace amber,
Perfume for a lady's chamber;
Golden quoifs and stomachers,
Pins and polking-sticks of steel.'

[B] Thin stuff for women's veils.

So, y