drawings, and, as they agree together in the style and
fashion of the costumes represented, there is no doubt that they give
us correct ideas of the dresses really worn. Besides, there are many
allusions in the chronicles of those times, and in poems and books of
accounts, which correspond precisely with the drawings, and thus
confirm their correctness and accuracy.
The engravings on the following page are copied from one of these
ancient manuscripts.
Observe the singular forms of the caps, both those of the men and of
the women. The men wore sometimes jackets, and sometimes long gowns
which came down to the ground. The most singular feature of the
dresses of the men, however, is the long-pointed shoes. Were it not
that fashions are often equally absurd at the present day, we should
think it impossible that such shoes as these could ever have been
made.
[Illustration: MALE COSTUME IN THE TIME OF RICHARD II.]
[Illustration: FEMALE COSTUME IN THE TIME OF RICHARD II.]
These shoes were called Cracows. Cracow was a town in Poland which was
at that time within the dominions of Anne's father, and it is supposed
that the fashion of wearing these shoes may have been brought into
England by some of the gentlemen in Anne's train, when she came to
England to be married. It is known that the queen did introduce a
great many foreign fashions to the court, and, among the rest, a
fashion of head-dress for ladies, which was quite as strange as peaked
shoes for the gentlemen. It consisted of what was called the horned
cap.
[Illustration: FASHIONABLE HEAD-DRESSES.]
These horns were often two feet high, and sometimes two feet wide from
one side to the other. The frame of this head-dress was made of wire
and pasteboard, and the covering was of some glittering tissue or
gauze. There were other head-dresses scarcely less monstrous than
these. Some of them are represented in the engraving. These fashions,
when introduced by the queen, spread with great rapidity among all the
court ladies, and thence to all fashionable circles in England.
It is said, too, that it was this young queen who first introduced
pins into England. Dresses had been fastened before by little skewers
made of wood or ivory. Queen Anne brought pins, which had been made
for some time in Germany, and the use of them soon extended all over
England.
Side-saddles for ladies on horseback were a third fashion which Queen
Anne is said to have introduced. The s
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