There've been a number of intriguing comments on this thread. To go back to the beginning, Emma asked about this picture, which she found in a discussion concerning the development of the farthingale:
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/ Image:Pedro_Garcia_de_Benabarre_St_John_Retable.jpg and her question was, "Salome was supposed to have danced naked before she asked for the head of John the Baptist. Is it possible that the artist depicted Salome in her underwear to hint at this nakedness, and that hoops were never actually worn on the outside? (if that's true, why are hoops also visible on the ladies behind her?) Are there any other depictions, anywhere, of hoops on the outside?" I suggest that we break up the question into 2 parts: (1) WHO was Salome? In the 21st century, what does "everybody know" about her? In the 15th century, what did "everybody know" about her? (2) WHAT is she wearing in this depiction? Is this style ever seen any where else? Does it have an iconographic meaning? To start with question #1, I'd like to re-iterate the point that several people made, which is that the Bible story never says that Salome took her clothes off. It just says that the king was pleased with the girl's dance, offered to give her anything she asked for, and she ran to her mama to ask what she should say. (Since her mama hated John the Baptist, she took advantage of the situation to have the guy put to death.) That doesn't sound much like a femme fatale. We don't even know how old she was! In fact, the earliest depictions of Salome as lascivious dancer that I was able to find in a quick search of my university library catalog date to the late 19th century in France. It appears that the story of Salome appealed to a number of arty types and they all had their own re-telling of the story -- Flaubert, Mallarme, Wilde [his play, Salome, was originally written in French], etc. -- which involved some sex and obsessive behavior, and then Richard Strauss was inspired to write an opera based on Wilde's version, and finally there was a turn-of-the-20th-century entertainer in London (Maud Allan) who made her name doing a scandalous version of Salome's "dance of the 7 veils" which was probably inspired by the then- current literary and operatic versions. I haven't investigated the Hollywood history of Salome but I'll bet it was equally fantasy-based. So, what did people in the 15th century "know" about Salome? They may have known that Salome was the stepdaughter of the king; they probably knew that John the Baptist had been preaching against the morals of the court and the queen was infuriated by his comments. Without the creative license of Strauss, et al., would they have imagined Salome as a woman of questionable virtue? I don't know. The only medieval versions I've seen of this scene are set at the king's banquet. If the viewer didn't "know" that Salome was doing a strip-tease then the viewer would see a girl of the noble family appearing at court, IMO. Other viewpoints welcome, of course. We can all learn from each other. :-) Going on to question #2, since the painting in question shows everyone fully dressed, right down to their hair and jewellery, I don't see any reason to re-interpret this as an informal scene. And for reasons that I stated yesterday, I don't believe that the other [non-Salome] depictions shared by list-members need to be interpreted as informal scenes. The image that provoked this discussion even seems to be embellished with 3-dimensional gold chains on the principal characters, which makes me think it is very formal indeed. If you look at the images in the link that otsisto sent http://tinyurl.com/4rk3xu you'll see many that appear in Anderson's book on Hispanic Costume. That work is generally considered to be a standard in the field and I don't remember Anderson suggesting that the verdugada is an undergarment. But I'd be happy to have input from folks who've studied this period! It seems to me that this is a short-lived fashion that is worthy of further study. Most of the evidence dates from 1470-1495 -- and we're still fascinated by it centuries later! Suzanne _______________________________________________ h-costume mailing list [email protected] http://mail.indra.com/mailman/listinfo/h-costume
