| Privateer Garb/Costuming:
While the clothing of the 16th and 17th
century privateer is significantly different from their land based
counterparts, pirates and privateers dressed much like other
mariners of their time. The captains and officers would wear good
woollen doublets and trunk hose while at sea, and often more
elaborate costume when ashore, including jeweled and embroidered
clothing (often in bright colours), wide ruffs, etc. The crew would
typically wear a chemise with either knee-length slops (baggy pants
gathered at the knee) or mid-calf length loose pants, either of wool
or sewn from worn out sail canvas.
While most people are familiar of the
swashbuckling "pirate costume", pictures of 16th century mariner's
are uncommon in the media. So many items and conventions of 16th
century dress may seem strange or unknown to you.
In developing a costume just remember
that functionality is the key to success at sea. There is little
need for fancy armour or gold braid. It is comfort and cost as well
as personality which determined a sailor's outfit.
Also, because a sailor travelled the
world over, he or she may borrow different articles of clothing from
a variety of countries and cultures. There are some examples
exisitng of western and eastern culture mixed together, although
this was somewhat uncommon.
In the past, just as is the case today
noble fabric commands a noble price, and when first starting out you
may want to develop a basic set of clothes which can be further
expanded upon with proceeds from future conquests. Once you have
your "working" set, you can then think about a suit a clothes to
wear for "the court".
Here are the basic components of a 16th
cenutry privateer costume:
The Hat:
By far, as is the case today, one of
the sailor's most distinctive garments is the hat. While many
pictures and descriptions of sailors suggest a kerchief is placed
over the head, this is historically inaccurate for the 16th and 17th
century .
Flat
Caps & Tams
In the 15th & 16th centuries, head-gear
during this time was usually a tall domed (known as a Thrum) or
bluntly peaked cap of felt, heavy cloth, frieze, or fur. It often
had a piece of line or a band of cloth to secure it to the head or
occasionally lappets under the chin. Spanish hats tended to have a
more "flat" appearance.
Here is a diagram from: Ye Olde Book O
Seadogs
Diagram 1: Sailor Hats: Ye Olde Booke O
Seadogs
Evidence of
the early "Skull Cap"
Diagram 1a: At Tollbund Bog near Viborg, Denmark, in
1944, the body of a man was discovered in almost perfect condition,
preserved by the bog water for 2000 years. He was wearing a cap sewn
from eight or nine pieces of leather with fur side inmost and
conical rather than dome-shaped, crown with a band along the lower
edge and a chin strap. The head and shoulders of this man, who still
wears his cap, can be seen in the National Museum at Copenhagen.
Diagram 2: Sailor
hats
Diagram 3: Spanish
Sailor Hat Diagram 4:
Ladies Sailor Hat
Cavalier Hats
While hats
have always played a role of reflecting social distinction, in the
17th century, dress and headdress were adopted to reflect specific
political and religious affiliations. In the beginning of
this period, the high and nearly brimless of the Elizabethan period
receded as a fashion in favor of the lower, wide brimmed hat.
This transition is further reflected in the gradual lowering of the
high, stiff Elizabethan collar. The high collar greatly
inhibited the wearing of a widely brimmed hat as the brim would
impact any time the wearer tilted their head to the side or
back.
 It has been suggested that this fashion change was
influenced by the popular spread of Swedish military dress
during the Thirty Years War (1618-1648), in which the English
soldiers would have had contact with their fellow Swedish
Protestants beginning in the 1630s. Swedish military dress
suggested a certain fluidity of movement.The blooming pantaloons,
blousy, ruffled shirts, floppy turned down boots, and of course the
cavalier hat, all reflected a looseness of stature and a
military swagger. J. F.
Crean describes, "the wide brim of the cavalier's hat almost
presupposes beaver felt: its broad brim was based on the
shape-holding qualities and resilience peculiar to beaver
felt."
 Sailors, Captains, Ship owners and other seagoing
merchant noblemen were quick to adopt the "cavalier" style
hat. The Cavalier hat gets it's name from supporters of King
Charles I during the English Civil War, known as
cavaliers
These hats featured a wide
brim. The swaggering Cavalier hat was conspicuous with broad
brim either rolled or cocked and ornamented with long ostrich
feathers, known as "weeping plumes." The crown was often
encircled with a jeweled necklace or a silk band sewn with gems. A
large gold ornament held the plumes. In those days of free sword
play, the feathers were placed to the back or left side of the hat,
permitting freedom of the sword arm. Furthermore, in court, the
hat ornament was often a love token, and the position on the left
side signified the heart or love. The decoration has ever since
remained on the left side.
Most cavalier hats were made of felt or
frieze, but by the 17th Century,with the strong beaver trade in the
Americas, meant that the wealthy could afford a fine beaver
pelt. The resultant high expense meant that beaver hats were
extremely costly and generally worn only by the wealthiest of
classes.
What is Felt? Isn't that a modern
invention?
Felt is a mass of wool and/or fur. It is not woven,
but rather pressed and manipulated in a centuries-old process using
hot water and steam to create the strongest, smoothest, lightest,
most water-resistant natural fabric known.
Felt has been used for producing headwear for
many centuries and is perhaps the oldest textile material.
Archaeological evidence shows that from very early on, people had
discovered the tendency for fibres to mat together when warm and
damp, many years before they learnt how to spin and weave yarn.
To this day there are three varieties of felt
used for hat making: wool felt, fur felt and beaver felt. Beaver
felt hats date back as far as the 14th Century with the majority of
production being based in Holland and Spain. European beaver skins
were first sent to Russia to be used as coat trimmings and then
re-imported into Holland as used furs would felt more easily. By the
early to mid 1600s the beaver's European breeding grounds became
exhausted, after which time North America became the main supplier
of skins to the trade.
Each manufacturer of felt closely guards his exact
felt making process and formula. According to legend, St. Clement
(the patron saint of felt hatmakers) discovered felt when, as a
wandering monk, he filled his sandals with flax fibers to protect
his feet. The moisture and pressure from pounding feet compressed
the fibers into a crude, though comfortable felt. Similar legends
suggest that Native Americans or ancient Egyptians "discovered" felt
by way of fur lined moccasins or camel hair falling into sandals. To
the hat industry, whoever was first is not as important as the fact
that felt hats function well. They are durable, comfortable, and
attractive.
Tricorne
Hats
 At sea, the wide
brim of the cavalier hat could be unwieldly, as a result, the sides
and back were pinned up, forming three triangles. It first appeared
sometime after 1650,
In the mid 1700's, the ramshackle privateering
fleets of various nations became unified into a single
fighting force, and with it rank, order, regulation and
common-dress. It was at this time that the Royal Navvies of the
world made their appearances, and seamen were organized by rank and
file. The casual seaman and fisherman became a member of
the merchant marine, and great fighting "ships of the line" were
organized into fleets for the defense (and offense) of
state. Officers' hats seemed at this time first to have been a
tricorne - or three-cornered - hat which was universal wear for
gentlemen in the 1600s and beyond. This was often adorned with a
cockade and gold lace. Again however, it was a matter of convention
rather than Admiralty orders which were responsible for this
uniformity.
A common sailor at this time wore a
wide-brimmed hat or a "skull cap". In 1706, a contract with a
London clothing merchant to outfit sailors listed: "Leather caps
faced with red cotton and lined with black-lined at the rate of one
shilling and twopence each". Around the year 1740 sailors were
wearing a wide-brimmed hat made out of a tarred sailcloth and from
this came the nickname 'tarpaulin' which eventually became 'Jack
Tar'.
Thus, the name 'Jack' came to described any
sailor. The sailor's pigtail - the longer the better - was also a
fashion of the mid-1700s. Many men wore the pigtail up on top of
their head, only displaying the full length of it on special
occasions such as Sundays.
For a time in the 1700s, sailors
imitated their officers a little in converting their headgear, at
least when ashore, into a tricorne hat by tacking the brim in three
places to the crown. This practice was discarded towards the end of
the century, with a low-crowned hat with a narrow brim being worn.
In the early 1700s, hat making had begun to
thrive in America. Britain responded with the HAT ACT of
1732, which forbade the export of beaver felt hats made in
the colonies. Britain forced Americans to buy British-made goods and
pay heavy taxes on them. Consequently, Americans paid four times
more for cloth and clothing than people in Great Britain, adding to
the grievances leading to the American Revolution (1776-1783).
Uniforms for members of the Royal Navy only
began to be formalised in 1748. The Admiralty order
promulgating the uniform regulations of 13 April 1748
commenced:
"Whereas we judge it necessary, in order the better
to distinguish the Rank of Sea Officers, to establish a Military
uniform cloathing for Admirals, Captains, Commanders and
Lieutenants, and judging it also necessary to distinguish their
class to be in the Rank of Gentlemen, and give them better credit
and figure in executing the commands of their superior officers; you
are hereby required and directed to conform yourself to the said
Establishment by wearing cloathing accordingly at all proper times;
and to take care that such of the aforesaid officers and midshipmen
who may be from time to time under your command do the
like
Up until then ships’ companies dressed in whatever
they owned. In that year the Admiralty decided to regulate naval
officers’ uniforms.
Prior to that year officers, and captains of ships
in particular, had worn what they pleased. It has been recorded that
one captain had worn a plain black tailcoat and a white top hat.
This type of headgear may seem out of place at sea but was commonly
worn until 1850 or later. It enjoys a special use to-day though not
in our own service: it is the custom in some ports which are
icebound in winter for the mayor to award a black top hat (and often
a gold- or silver-headed cane) to the first merchant captain to
enter the port after the first winter season. Another captain is
said to have worn a coat of such thin material that his red braces
showed through. Several R.C.N. officers knowingly perpetuate this
custom, if it is one, of wearing red braces.
In the Royal Navy, the first pattern for an
officers’ uniform from then onwards fell into two parts: a “dress
suit’ and a “frock”. In general the first uniforms were varieties of
blue coats. There was at first no mention of a hat but
officers usually wore the black tricorn hat popular amongst
gentlemen.
By 1760, most other navvies had official uniforms,
and the Tricorne hat became adopted by naval officers around
the world.
As well, the Tricorne soon became an icon of
the American Revolution, and symbolized "taxation without
representation", and was worn by the fledgling colonial and militia
troops and navy.
Around 1795, officers' hats went through a
transformation. Gold lace became confined to flag officers in both
dress and undress uniforms; captains wore it only in full dress. The
three-cornered hats became two-cornered. It was at first worn
'athwartships' by all, but this soon became the prerogative of
flag-officers, and others wore the hat fore and
aft.
Bi-Corne
Hat
 The bicorne or bicorn (two-cornered) is an archaic form
of hat associated with the late 18th and early 19th
centuries. Primarily worn by European and American military and
naval officers, it is most readily associated with Napoléon
Bonaparte. In practice most generals and staff officers of the
Napoleonic period wore bicornes, and it survived as a widely worn
full-dress headdress until at least 1914.
Descended from the tricorne, the black-coloured bicorne
originally had a rather broad brim, with the front and the rear
halves turned up and pinned together, forming a semi-circular fan
shape; there was usually a cockade in the national colours at the
front. Later, the hat became more triangular in shape, its two ends
became more pointed, and it was worn with the cockade at the right
side. This kind of bicorne eventually became known in the English
language as the cocked hat, although to
this day it is still known in the French language as the
bicorne.
Some forms of bicorne were designed to be folded flat, so that
they could be conveniently tucked under the arm when not being worn.
A bicorne of this style is also known as a chapeau-bras or
chapeau-de-bras.
By halfway through the Napoleonic wars the sailors' formal hat -
if he had one - was made either of leather or japanned canvas.
Men did not wear cocked hats after 1780, and when worn by
officers they were worn athwartships until 1795, and fore-and-aft
from that year, at first for only Captains and below. Flag Officers
wore cocked hats athwartships until 1825. The cocked hat for men was
replaced with a shiny black tarpaulin hat with the name of the ship
on a broad black ribbon. Straw hats were not introduced from the
West Indies until 1802, and were in use until
1922.
Top Hats:
 By the
1800's sailor's uniforms begain to change, with provincial navvies,
revenue cutters and the coast guard. Often sailors wore top round
hats, painted or left felt, plain or with painted
device, either with the ship’s name, or ribbon (“tally”)
bearing same in white, gilt or yellow paint/stitching. They also
wore what as known as a “tarpot”. A painted canvas
low-crown hat, decorated as per top-round hats or left plain, or
they would wear wool stocking caps of various colours; Also
popular, wwas the fur cap & straw hats, either natural
or painted, with “tally” or without; and
finally the bandana, knotted at rear, of non-modern
design; or bareheaded.
Headgear for
the common sailor varied between a simple cloth bandana, often
tied at the rear to keep sweat out of the eyes, to the straw hat.
This was particularly common to those sailors who had
been to the West Indies.
By the middle of the 19th century
the round top-hat reached universal acceptance, and the crown of the
hat became considerably higher, with sailors decorating the crown
with badges obtained from various landfalls. Meanwhile officers
adopted a blue cap with a gold band for use as a less formal hat.
Unofficial at first, the new cap in time became general undress
headgear, although the black 'top' hat was also occasionally
seen.
The cocked hat, which had been worn by some warrant
officers and midshipmen, was replaced by this tall black hat for
both ranks.
Hat Making Links :
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