Not a bad theory but it does have a wee bit o' problem with it. Though I am sure that the probability of most noble women in the Italian States had the merchant come to them (early rendition of the home shopping network. :) ), probably from time to time they went out to shop. For the big expenditures they would probably have had to have their sponse or head of household send the money and make the final sale or if they were the head (widow, courtesan, lady of the evening, etc..)they would make arrangements. Even so, I believe that they would have to carry some money for emergencies, on the spot small transactions therefore they would need a pouch of a sorts. As for putting a pouch in a basket...well....that is asking for it to be stolen. From paintings it would appear that people liked to keep their money close and a basket is not close enough. :) They may not have carried cell phones and the modern stuff normally carried in a purse but there were probably small items carried. This statement is mostly based on the early 1500s "German" multi-pocket purse. Most times when I have heard someone say that a woman is wearing an alms pouch in the picture (even if it does not look like an alms pouch) it is based on what they have been told "that women do not wear pouches" Perhaps there are few paintings with women wearing pouches is that it is probably under thier skirts. IMO, I have seen enough Italian paintings from the Renaissance that gives me the impression that the pouch under at least the out garment was a common practice, even for the noble woman. Again, I have not done any strong research in this area so it is more conjecture then hard fact.
De aka in SCA: Delis Alms (Calontir)(Friese) or (alt)Fiordelisia Dragano da Parma (N. Italia) (alt)Arian verch Gwydion (Wales) (alt) Sandrine D'Avalon (Burgundy) (alt) Audaelfr Almsveig (Norse) -----Original Message----- My pet theory is that noblewomen didn't wear pouches at all, not the way we seem to want to in the SCA. They didn't do their own shopping for the most part, and they didn't go anywhere without people to carry stuff for them, so why would they need them? They didn't have spare change/car keys/mobile phones etc that they needed to keep close to their persons. Similarly, if you were of a class where you might be going to the markets etc you'd probably have a basket with you, so you could just put your purse in that. There are very few instances where women are depicted wearing purses or pouches (they're a bit more common on men), apart from the 13th century, where we're usually told that this are almonieres (or some variant spelling), used for dispensing alms. This is not very handy, of course, if you do want somewhere to carry your car keys around. In which case I'm also rather fond of the 'worn under the gown, accessible through a pocket slit' approach. There is a certain amount of evidence for this, although not really Italian Renn. evidence. Claire/Angharad _ _______________________________________________ h-costume mailing list [email protected] http://mail.indra.com/mailman/listinfo/h-costume
