A Cultural History of Dress and Fashion in the Medieval Age (The Cultural Histories Series Book 2)

During the medieval period, people invested heavily in looking good. The finest fashions demanded careful chemistry and compounds imported from great distances and at considerable risk to merchants; the Church became a major consumer of both the richest and humblest varieties of cloth, shoes, and adornment; and vernacular poets began to embroider their stories with hundreds of verses describing a plethora of dress styles, fabrics, and shopping experiences. Drawing on a wealth of pictorial, textual and object sources, the volume examines how dress cultures developed – often to a degree of dazzling sophistication – between the years 800 to 1450. Beautifully illustrated with 100 images, __A Cultural History of Dress and Fashion in the Medieval Age__ presents an overview of the period with essays on textiles, production and distribution, the body, belief, gender and sexuality, status, ethnicity, visual representations, and literary representations. A cultural history of dress and fashion' presents an authoritative survey from ancient times to the present. This set of six volumes covers over 2,500 years of dress and fashion. Volume 1: Antiquity (500BCE-800AD) / edited by Mary Harlow -- Volume 2: The Medieval Age (800-1450) / edited by Sarah-Grace Heller -- Volume 3: The Renaissance (1450-1650) / edited by Elizabeth Currie-- Volume 4: The Age of Enlightenment (1650-1800) / edited by Peter McNeil -- Volume 5: In the Age of Empire (1800-1920) / edited by Denise Amy Baxter -- Volume 6: The Modern Age (1920-2000+) / edited by Alexandra Palmer. Each volume discusses the same key themes in its chapters: 1. Textiles 2. Production and Distribution 3. The Body 4. Belief 5. Gender and Sexuality 6. Status 7. Ethnicity 8. Visual Representations 9. Literary Representations. This structure means readers can either have a broad overview of a period by reading a volume or follow a theme through history by reading the relevant chapter in each volume. Superbly illustrated, the full six volume set combines to present the most authoritative and comprehensive survey available on dress and fashion through history