Oes or owes were metallic O-shaped rings or eyelets sewn on to clothes and furnishing textiles for decorative effect. Made of gold, silver, or copper, they were used on clothing and furnishing fabrics and were smaller than modern sequins. They were made either from rings of wire or punched out of a sheet of metal. [1]
Robert Sharp obtained a patent to make gold oes and spangles (another early variety of sequin) in 1575. [2] They were also made from silver and copper. [3] Oes were made either from rings of wire wound around a dowel, or by punching flat rings out of a sheet of metal. [4]
Goldsmiths including Cornelis Hayes made spangles for the court. [5] Spangles or "spangs" were mentioned in connection with head dresses worn by the maids of honour, set on wires and known as "hanging spangles". [6]
Policy makers worried about the supply of precious metal bullion and restricted the making of gold and silver oes and similar products by patent to the Company of Wire Drawers. In July 1624, their manufacture was forbidden for a time. [7]
Some London hat band makers were prosecuted and fined in 1631 for the fraud of using gilt copper oes and claiming their wares employed only gold oes and thread. [8] Imitation silver or gold oes sold openly were called "counterfeit oes" or "Alchemy oes", and appear as "Olcamee oes" in the 1643 inventory of a Worcestershire mercer Thomas Cowcher. [9] Thomas Knyvett sent his wife and Aunt Bell 12 ounces of counterfeit oes and oes of "right silver" in paper wraps in 1623. He offered to buy oes of a different size if required. There were three kinds of oes available. A paper of oes contained 40 oes weighing 2 ounces. [10]
Oes were used to decorate hairnets called "crespines" or "crippins", an item of clothing worn by women of the Tudor court and Elizabeth I. [11] Some of her doublets were decorated with "squares of silver owes". [12] An inventory of 1626 mentions a white satin crippin embroidered with gold oes and a green satin crippin with silver oes. [13] As a New Year Day's gift in January 1600 Dorothy Speckard and her husband gave Queen Elizabeth a head veil of striped network, flourished with carnation silk and embroidered with oes. [14]
Edmund Palmer embroidered a purple satin suit for Prince Henry with silk thread, silver thread, and silver oes. [15] Oes were stitched by embroiderers to form patterns. The Earl of Northampton owned a sweet bag embroidered with knots of silver oes and burning hearts. [16]
An inventory of the clothes of Anne of Denmark includes a gown and bodice embroidered with "silver purl plate and oes". [17] A portrait of Catherine Howard, Countess of Suffolk by Paul van Somer shows her dressed in a silver satin gown embroidered with emblems and insects using spangles or oes. It has been suggested the embroidered motifs depicted in the painting derive from Henry Peacham's Minerva Brittana. [18]
Oes were used in masque costume. [19] In 1610 the embroiderer Christopher Shawe worked on the skirts for the dancers in the masque Tethys' Festival , sewing on silver "oes", and embroidering gold "oes" on tiffany fabric. [20] The grass-green and sea-green costumes made for this masque and Love Freed from Ignorance and Folly match the advice of Francis Bacon, who wrote "colours that show best by candlelight are white, carnation, and a kind of sea-water green; and oes and spangs as they are of no great cost, so they are of most glory". [21] [22] Bacon was probably writing from his own experience, after funding The Masque of Flowers . [23]
In February 1613, the character of Honor in Chapman's The Memorable Masque of the Middle Temple and Lincoln's Inn wore a "vaile of net lawne, embrodered with Oos and Spangl'd". [24] In literature, oes and spangles could be associated with vain luxury and the glittering stars of the night sky. Henry Hawkins wrote of the sky "beset with siluer-oes" and the stars as "siluer Oes, al powdred heer and there, or spangles sprinckled ouer the purple Mantle or night-gowne of the heauens". [25]
Purchases of oes are recorded in the household book of Lord William Howard of Naworth Castle. He ordered silver and gold oes from London in 1620 for Mistress Marie, copper oes for his children's clothes in 1621, and gold oes in March 1634 for the tailor making clothes for his wife Elizabeth Dacre. [26]
Used on furnishing fabrics, oes sometimes appear in inventories. At Westmorland House in London in the 1620s, a London home of Francis Fane, 1st Earl of Westmorland and Mary Mildmay Fane, Countess of Westmorland, there was a couch in the best withdrawing room set in a canopy with curtains, embellished with embroidered slips and gold oes. [27] Old inventories describe "oes" decorating the surviving "Spangled bed" at Knole. [28]
In French, the equivalents of spangles and oes were known as paillettes or papillottes. [29] Mary, Queen of Scots, had gold and silver papillottes for her masques costumes as a girl in France. [30] She requested silver papillottes for her embroidery from the diplomat Mothe Fénélon in 1574, as delicate and beautiful as he could find. [31] 18th-century furnishing bills include references to functional "oes", round eyelets used to guide curtain cords. [32]
Tinsel is a type of decorative material that mimics the effect of ice, consisting of thin strips of sparkling material attached to a thread. When in long narrow strips not attached to thread, it is called "lametta", and emulates icicles. It was originally a metallic garland for Christmas decoration. The modern production of tinsel typically involves plastic, and is used particularly to decorate Christmas trees. It may be hung from ceilings or wrapped around statues, lampposts, and so on. Modern tinsel was invented in Nuremberg, Germany, in 1610, and was originally made of shredded silver.
Fashion in the period 1550–1600 in European clothing was characterized by increased opulence. Contrasting fabrics, slashes, embroidery, applied trims, and other forms of surface ornamentation remained prominent. The wide silhouette, conical for women with breadth at the hips and broadly square for men with width at the shoulders had reached its peak in the 1530s, and by mid-century a tall, narrow line with a V-lined waist was back in fashion. Sleeves and women's skirts then began to widen again, with emphasis at the shoulder that would continue into the next century. The characteristic garment of the period was the ruff, which began as a modest ruffle attached to the neckband of a shirt or smock and grew into a separate garment of fine linen, trimmed with lace, cutwork or embroidery, and shaped into crisp, precise folds with starch and heated irons.
The French hood is a type of woman's headgear that was popular in Western Europe in the 16th century.
Hymenaei, or The Masque of Hymen, was a masque written by Ben Jonson for the marriage of Robert Devereux, 3rd Earl of Essex, and Lady Frances Howard, daughter of the Earl of Suffolk, and performed on their wedding day, 5 January 1606. The costumes, sets, and scenic effects were designed by Inigo Jones, and the music composed by Alfonso Ferrabosco.
The Vision of the Twelve Goddesses was an early Jacobean-era masque, written by Samuel Daniel and performed in the Great Hall of Hampton Court Palace on the evening of Sunday, 8 January 1604. One of the earliest of the Stuart Court masques, staged when the new dynasty had been in power less than a year and was closely engaged in peace negotiations with Spain, The Vision of the Twelve Goddesses stood as a precedent and a pattern for the many masques that followed during the next four decades.
A partlet was a 16th-century fashion accessory. The partlet was a sleeveless garment worn over the neck and shoulders, either worn over a dress or worn to fill in a low neckline.
Lady Audrey Walsingham was an English courtier. She served as Lady of the Bedchamber to queen Elizabeth I of England, and then as Mistress of the Robes to Anne of Denmark from 1603 until 1619.
Servais de Condé or Condez was a French servant at the court of Mary Queen of Scots, in charge of her wardrobe and the costume for masques performed at the Scottish royal court.
Tethys' Festival was a masque produced on 5 June 1610 to celebrate the investiture of Prince Henry (1594–1612) as Prince of Wales.
Dorothy Speckard or Speckart or Spekarde was a courtier, milliner, silkwoman, and worker in the wardrobe of Elizabeth I of England, Anne of Denmark, Prince Henry, and Henrietta Maria. Her husband, Abraham Speckard, was an investor in the Somers Isles Company which colonised Bermuda.
Alexander Miller or Millar (1559-1616) was an Edinburgh tailor who served James VI and I.
The wardrobe of Mary, Queen of Scots, was described in several contemporary documents, and many records of her costume have been published.
The wedding of Elizabeth Stuart (1596–1662), daughter of James VI and I, and Frederick V of the Palatinate (1596–1632) was celebrated in London in February 1613. There were fireworks, masques, tournaments, and a mock-sea battle or naumachia. Preparations involved the construction of a "Marriage room", a hall adjacent to the 1607 Banqueting House at Whitehall Palace. The events were described in various contemporary pamphlets and letters.
Christopher Shawe or Shaw was an English embroiderer and textile artist who worked on masque costume for Anne of Denmark. He was a member of the Worshipful Company of Broderers.
A silkwoman was a woman in medieval, Tudor, and Stuart England who traded in silks and other fine fabrics. London silkwomen held some trading rights independently from their husbands and were exempted from some of the usual customs and laws of coverture. The trade and craft of the silkwoman was encouraged by a statute of Henry VI of England as a countermeasure to imports of silk thread, and a suitable occupation for "young gentlewomen and other apprentices".
Walter Fyshe was a London tailor who worked for Elizabeth I until 1582. He also made some of her farthingales. Fyshe made the queen's ceremonial clothes and coronation robes, altering robes made for the coronation of Mary I of England.
Jean de Compiègne or Jehan de Conpiegne was a French tailor who served Mary, Queen of Scots, in Scotland and England. He is frequently mentioned in her accounts and in her letters. His name appears in various spellings in Scottish records, including "Jean Decumpanze". He was also known as "Jehan Poulliet", and signed his name as "Jehan Poullyet".
Benjamin Henshawe (1585–1631) was a London merchant tailor and silkman who supplied fabrics and passementerie for costume and furnishings for the royal court. His widow, Anna Henshawe, continued in business with William Geere.
A safeguard or saveguard was a riding garment or overskirt worn by women in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Some safeguards were intended to protect skirts or kirtles worn beneath. Mary Frith, dramatised as the character Moll Cutpurse in The Roaring Girl, wore a black safeguard over breeches.
The Masque of Flowers was an entertainment on 6 January 1614 to celebrate the marriage of Robert Carr, 1st Earl of Somerset and Frances Howard, Countess of Somerset.
