# How would the ancients consider our style of dress? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [May 17, 2014, 7:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-the-ancients-consider-our-style-of-dress/688646 "2014-05-17T19:17:40Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Senegoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senegoid/32/6606_2.png) [@Senegoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Senegoid)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2014, 10:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-the-ancients-consider-our-style-of-dress/688646/21 "2014-05-18T10:33:40Z")
Did the ancients have anything resembling neckties? If not, then they were far more civilized than we are today. ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2014, 11:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-the-ancients-consider-our-style-of-dress/688646/22 "2014-05-18T11:47:02Z")
I think they’d be shocked by how little class distinctions there are in clothing. In the past, you could tell someone’s precise social status at a glance; now, while you can still get an idea of how rich or poor someone is by their clothing, things are much more nebulous. Some poorer people dress up, while some rich people dress down, and without careful examination it’s often hard to know who is who. The fact that the upper 10% and the lower 10% could walk around in basically the same t-shirts, jeans and sneakers would be amaze the ancients. In fact , the very concept of “casual wear” would be alien to them. People in the past, rich or poor, basically wore the same clothing everywhere. ---
**Author:** ![panache45](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/panache45/32/64_2.png) [@panache45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/panache45)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2014, 1:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-the-ancients-consider-our-style-of-dress/688646/23 "2014-05-18T13:11:15Z")
Cold-weather outerwear, and the materials it’s composed of. Anything with “designer” logos. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2014, 2:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-the-ancients-consider-our-style-of-dress/688646/24 "2014-05-18T14:20:16Z")
> [@Alessan](#): > > In fact , the very concept of “casual wear” would be alien to them. People in the past, rich or poor, basically wore the same clothing everywhere. Mainly because cloth was so expensive that only the richest could actually _afford_ more than one or two good outfits. The sheer quantity & variety of different articles of clothing that an average modern individual has would shock them. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2014, 4:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-the-ancients-consider-our-style-of-dress/688646/25 "2014-05-18T16:05:48Z")
> [@Nava](#): > > Think of them as pre-nylon fannypacks. I’ve long been curious as to whether the invention of pockets was a matter of thinking “hmmm… I could just put a sort of bag sewn to those slits…” or the first pockets were in a different kind of clothing. The earliest pockets I know of, are in Elizabethan-era trunkhose (poofy pants) and a doublet (jacket) and are just like modern pockets. Cite: Janet Arnold, _Patterns of Fashion_, pp 54, 63, 75, 86-90. See also the kid’s pants [in this Moroni portrait](http://www.artistclon.com/OtherFile/Giovanni-Battista-Moroni-xx-Portrait-of-a-Man-and-a-Boy-Count-Alborghetti-&-Son-1545-50.jpg). ---
**Author:** ![alphaboi867](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alphaboi867/32/3898_2.png) [@alphaboi867](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/alphaboi867)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2014, 8:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-the-ancients-consider-our-style-of-dress/688646/26 "2014-05-18T20:04:52Z")
> [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](#): > > They were. Probably until well into modern times, you carried your money (all coins, of course) in a coin purse that, judging from fifteenth and sixteenth century paintings, you kept tied to your belt line. You might carry a dagger or sword, but that had its own scabbard, also hanging from your waist. And what more did you need than your coin purse and sword? _Codpieces_ also served as wallets for men. ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2014, 8:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-the-ancients-consider-our-style-of-dress/688646/27 "2014-05-18T20:33:19Z")
> [@panache45](#): > > Cold-weather outerwear, and the materials it’s composed of. > > Anything with “designer” logos. Not just designer logos—did anyone prior to the 20th century ever wear clothes with words, logos, or pictures (e.g. of characters from pop culture) on them? ---
**Author:** ![Trinopus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/2bfe46/32.png) [@Trinopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trinopus)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2014, 11:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-the-ancients-consider-our-style-of-dress/688646/28 "2014-05-18T23:07:34Z")
Well, crusaders wore the Cross, and there were other emblems of pilgrimage – the green turban of the Hajji, and so on. Didn’t ancient Chinese costume involve embroidery of characters, not necessarily in the form of sentences or slogans, but of individual figures with fortunate meaning? ---
**Author:** ![Arrendajo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e0b2c6/32.png) [@Arrendajo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Arrendajo)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2014, 11:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-the-ancients-consider-our-style-of-dress/688646/29 "2014-05-18T23:33:55Z")
Also I remember an account of European visitors to China (late 18th or early 19th century?) who were amazed to see \>gasp!\< women wearing trousers, or pantaloons they might have called them. ---
**Author:** ![Flywheel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/eb8c5e/32.png) [@Flywheel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Flywheel)\ **Post date:** [May 19, 2014, 12:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-the-ancients-consider-our-style-of-dress/688646/30 "2014-05-19T00:10:38Z")
> [@Thudlow\_Boink](#): > > Not just designer logos—did anyone prior to the 20th century ever wear clothes with words, logos, or pictures (e.g. of characters from pop culture) on them? I can recommend an excellent [book](http://www.amazon.com/The-Scarlet-Letter-Nathaniel-Hawthorne/dp/1613823819/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1400458211&sr=8-2&keywords=the+scarlet+letter) on that subject. ---
**Author:** ![Sunspace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sunspace/32/1250_2.png) [@Sunspace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunspace)\ **Post date:** [May 19, 2014, 12:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-the-ancients-consider-our-style-of-dress/688646/31 "2014-05-19T00:37:15Z")
> [@Trinopus](#): > > Well, crusaders wore the Cross, and there were other emblems of pilgrimage – the green turban of the Hajji, and so on. > > Didn’t ancient Chinese costume involve embroidery of characters, not necessarily in the form of sentences or slogans, but of individual figures with fortunate meaning? Isn’t that basically what heraldry started out as: logos so that you could distinguish Knight A from Knight B? ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [May 19, 2014, 10:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-the-ancients-consider-our-style-of-dress/688646/32 "2014-05-19T10:16:12Z")
> [@alphaboi867](#): > > _Codpieces_ also served as wallets for men. I suppose that presented them with a dilemma; if they boasted of being rich it meant they admitted to being poorly endowed, but if they boasted of being well endowed they were admitting to poverty. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2014, 4:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-the-ancients-consider-our-style-of-dress/688646/33 "2014-05-20T04:46:02Z")
> [@Alessan](#): > > In fact , the very concept of “casual wear” would be alien to them. People in the past, rich or poor, basically wore the same clothing everywhere. Go to any RCC church on a Sunday and look around. Every single woman would have been expelled from that same building in 1950; the men would have been expelled right behind. Uncovered heads! Shirtsleeves! Such _debauchery_! > [@MrDibble](#): > > The earliest pockets I know of, are in Elizabethan-era trunkhose (poofy pants) and a doublet (jacket) and are just like modern pockets. Cite: Janet Arnold, _Patterns of Fashion_, pp 54, 63, 75, 86-90. See also the kid’s pants [in this Moroni portrait](http://www.artistclon.com/OtherFile/Giovanni-Battista-Moroni-xx-Portrait-of-a-Man-and-a-Boy-Count-Alborghetti-&-Son-1545-50.jpg). Thank you. Re the portrait those are not pockets unless there is a bag sewn to their inside: otherwise they’re the kind of slit I was talking about, minus the hiding folds. ---
**Author:** ![AK84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/85e7bf/32.png) [@AK84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AK84)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2014, 5:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-the-ancients-consider-our-style-of-dress/688646/34 "2014-05-20T05:26:09Z")
> [@Alessan](#): > > I think they’d be shocked by how little class distinctions there are in clothing. In the past, you could tell someone’s precise social status at a glance; now, while you can still get an idea of how rich or poor someone is by their clothing, things are much more nebulous. Some poorer people dress up, while some rich people dress down, and without careful examination it’s often hard to know who is who. The fact that the upper 10% and the lower 10% could walk around in basically the same t-shirts, jeans and sneakers would be amaze the ancients. > > In fact , the very concept of “casual wear” would be alien to them. People in the past, rich or poor, basically wore the same clothing everywhere. Nah, just Israelis.😃 ;). Seriously, I had an Israeli colleague,who was always dressed inappropriately. I took to carrying a spare tie in my pocket. I did eventually manage to cure him. You are on a serious note right of course. Clothing is still a marker, but good and cheap clothes are readily available which was not the case until fairly recently. As in the 1970’s. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2014, 6:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-the-ancients-consider-our-style-of-dress/688646/35 "2014-05-20T06:37:08Z")
> [@Nava](#): > > Thank you. Re the portrait those are not pockets unless there is a bag sewn to their inside: otherwise they’re the kind of slit I was talking about, minus the hiding folds. The other pants I referred to do all have the lining bag, or traces of it, and in a couple of cases, exactly that sort of edge-binding as in the portrait. On the other hand, I don’t know of any slits like that found in extant trunkhose, that _don’t_ have pocket bags associated. This doesn’t mean they wouldn’t exist, of course. Just that I’ve never heard of them in pants (whereas I’ve heard plenty of the ones in dresses like you referenced) ---
**Author:** ![Saintly\_Loser](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/saintly_loser/32/4045_2.png) [@Saintly\_Loser](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Saintly_Loser)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2014, 7:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-the-ancients-consider-our-style-of-dress/688646/36 "2014-05-20T19:22:08Z")
> [@panache45](#): > > Shoes, especially sneakers and women’s high heels. Or a good pair of work boots. Even into modern times. An eighteenth-century Irish farmer, working the bog for his potatoes, would have considered a pair of Timberlands a gift from God Himself. ---
**Author:** ![Ethilrist](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ethilrist/32/4604_2.png) [@Ethilrist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ethilrist)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2014, 8:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-the-ancients-consider-our-style-of-dress/688646/37 "2014-05-20T20:07:53Z")
I think they’d find our clothes to be unduly restrictive… a robe or toga with a belt at the waist would allow a freedom of movement you just don’t get in blue jeans. As mentioned above, people only had a couple outfits they could wear, and the literally could not afford to split their pants when they bent over to pick something up, so there was usually a lot of room in side the clothes. Also, it’s difficult to tailor something to fit closely when you’ve only got four pins and you’re cutting the cloth with a pair of sheep shears… early patterns tended to be big, blocky rectangles, rather than form-fitting curves like we have now. ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2014, 8:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-the-ancients-consider-our-style-of-dress/688646/38 "2014-05-20T20:13:44Z")
> [@Trinopus](#): > > (And just wait till our ancient observers get to the beach! Waikiki on July 4th! Yay!) Some things just don’t go out of style … 😃 > **[File:Villa romana bikini girls.JPG](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Villa_romana_bikini_girls.JPG)** > > Original file (4,227 × 2,747 pixels, file size: 10.82 MB, MIME type: image/jpeg) > Click on a date/time to view the file as it appeared at that time. > You cannot overwrite this file. The following 3 pages use this file: ---
**Author:** ![Don\_t\_Panic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/don_t_panic/32/398_2.png) [@Don\_t\_Panic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Don_t_Panic)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2014, 3:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-the-ancients-consider-our-style-of-dress/688646/39 "2014-05-21T03:10:24Z")
> [@Ethilrist](#): > > I think they’d find our clothes to be unduly restrictive… a robe or toga with a belt at the waist would allow a freedom of movement you just don’t get in blue jeans. Robes, tunics and cloaks were most likely all pretty comfortable, but the toga was formal wear, and was notorious for being a pain in the ass. Especially in the later days of the Roman Empire, it became a huge and unwieldy thing, and it would take ages to get yourself into one. It had to be wrapped around and held up by one arm, which is hardly practical. It was impossible to do any manual labor, fight wars or perform any kind of casual activity in it. The Romans got so sick and tired of the toga that the Emperor Augustus had to enforce a law to make people wear it in the forum and at the circus. (Also, I personally find my slacker blue jeans to be the most comfortable thing ever, and I’m not about to swap them for a tunic. On the other hand, those skin-tight things that women vacuum pack themselves into, and that makes them look like they’ll explode if they bend over… maybe not so much.) ---
**Author:** ![MahFL](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/bbce88/32.png) [@MahFL](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MahFL)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2014, 2:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-the-ancients-consider-our-style-of-dress/688646/40 "2014-05-21T14:16:02Z")
Well if they were like those dudes in the forest with only a string holding up their penises, they would probably think we are over dressed… Also if it was not for the Christians a lot more boobies would be on show… [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-the-ancients-consider-our-style-of-dress/688646.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-would-the-ancients-consider-our-style-of-dress/688646.md?page=3)