Dress and Personal Appearance in Late Antiquity

Abstract

This thesis examines the dress and personal appearance of members of the middle and lower classes during Late Antiquity. Although members of this social stratum are often represented in Late Antique written sources, their clothing is rarely described in any detail, nor can artistic depictions be relied upon to illustrate their garments realistically. Information has therefore been assembled on garments and garment fragments from over 52 museum and archaeological collections, in order to assess the ways that cloth and clothing was made, embellished, cared for and recycled during this period. Together with knowledge gained by making and modelling exact replicas based on extant garments, this has enabled both the accurate depiction of the dress of ordinary people during this period, and the more precise interpretation of Late Antique descriptions and depictions of the clothed figure. By further assessing this information using different theoretical approaches including that of ‘object biography’, this thesis goes on to explore the ways in which cultural meaning is invested in clothing, and what this tells us both about the people who made, wore and used it, and about the society of which they were a part.