#5 THE BLACK DEATH!!! (1300 - 1400 c.e.)

Poor Western Civilization.

"Who? Us?"

There they were, eating food, weaving on horizontal looms, going on crusades, and making up rules about what people could wear when BAM!

the Bubonic Plague

That's right, the Black Death,which it's called cause it made the skin rot and turn black in places.

Like this

They think it started on rats in China, made it's way through Constantinople (which is now Istanbul) by way of rats, and eventually rode trade ships (and the backs of rats) all the way through all of Europe.

Rats!

So that was a bummer.  No one knows for sure how many people died but it was a lot.  Wikipedia says somewhere between 75 million and 200 million people.  MILLION.

With that many dead friends/neighbors/family members, EVERYONE
had to pitch in and carry caskets.

Folks didn't know how this massive pandemic started so there were all sorts of things they tried.  They thought perhaps that miasmas (fog) caused it so everyone avoided bad air.  They burned fires and sniffed herbs.  They asked the Pope to ask God to slow the disease 

"Please?"

but he was busy sitting between two giant fires himself to try to keep the disease away.  

This is what a doctor would wear when visiting plague victims.
the nose of the mask is full of herbs which allegedly kept the disease at bay.
He also carried the stick because he wasn't about to touch anyone or
anything with his hands.
I guess looking super creepy was just a bonus.

People, when faced with an environment where EVERYONE IS DYING

Like this

start looking for somewhere to place the blame.   Some devout Catholics decided that God was punishing all of them so in an attempt to appease this vengeful God, they started walking around barefoot and hitting themselves with whips.

Good times.

Oddly, self-mutilation failed to halt the spread of the bacteria.   Folks then tried witches and amulets and lucky charms and basically anything they could think of.

Which you would do, too, if your kid got sick

Some people actually decided that Jewish people were the reason they had the disease and started killing Jews.

Because when things are awful, the best thing to do is make everything awfuler.

Why do I bring this up?  Well, because it changed just about everything in Europe.  If 40-70% of the people in any given place are dead, then who is going to grow the food?  Which, by the way, didn't want to grow because right after the plague slowed down, The Little Ice Age began.

"This is the worst century EVER"

There was famine, low population, cold, and misery.   Naturally, there was war, and a lot of it, because all the infrastructure was messed up (again.)  Oddly, all of this horribleness was important in the development of the coming Renaissance but it sure was rotten to live through.

What does this mean for fashion?  Well, for women, the ideal silhouette was to look pregnant.

"Do we look pregnant enough?"

Since the women were still wearing the kirtle (or smock, or chemise, or dress) they enhanced this "I-totally-am-fertile-look-at-my-pretend-baby-bump" look by belting their dresses right up under the bustline and standing like supermodels, pelvis out.

"You, milady, are looking foxy in that maternity dress!"

Why would they do this?  Well, the official excuse is they all aspired to be like the Virgin Mary, and reflect the holy pregnancy in their own fashion.  More probably this fashion happened because everyone was DEAD and folks needed to start making some BABIES!

Also, during this time period, an unfortunate thing began happening in menswear.

"Does your mom know you walk around in a skirt that short?"

The waist line of men's tunics was dropped to the hips to make the body look longer. (Kind of like it is today.)  Well, obviously, the skirts had to be shorter so they wouldn't look dumpy and eventually the skirt of the tunic was as short as you see it above. The problem with that is the hose the men would wear didn't have... um.. crotches in them.  When you're wearing tights you can't wear boxers under them.  They would be all bunchy.  So, each leg was a single tube and they tied at the top to a belt at the waist, leaving the middle open.  All the time.

If your skirt is that short, you are wearing crotchless pants, and it's COLD, something has to be done.  (Well, something other than accidentally flashing people all the time.)What was done was this:

This is the least offensive picture I could find.
It's still pretty offensive.

A triangular bit of fabric was pinned or buttoned to the front of the two legs of the hose and helped prevent immodesty.  It's called a codpiece.  For the most part it was hidden under the skirt of the tunic but (ominous foreshadowing) it wouldn't stay hidden for long. (dum dum DUMMM) More on this next week.  

However, another bit of fashion was invented in the deathly cold 14th century.  The houppeland!

The dude in pink is wearing a houppelande

It's basically a ginormous bathrobe with super long sleeves that are pinked (cut with fancy edges).  Women wore them too.

"Aw, yeah, we be rocking us some houppelands."

Of  course people were appalled at the outrageous waste of fabric and criticized them.  You will not be surprised to learn that this criticism stopped exactly nobody.

So, that's some brief information about the Late Middle Ages, which are also known as the Middle Gothic Period.

wrong kind of gothic...

Thaat's better...

It was a terrible time in Western history but at least the women stopped wearing those pointy princess hats.

"Obviously you are intimidated by my glamour.."

Now, go take your test!

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