Girdles: their origin and development, particularly with regard to their use as charms in medicine, marriage, and midwifery / [Walter J. Dilling].

Dilling, Walter J. (Walter James), 1886-1950.

Date:: 1913-14

Credit: Girdles: their origin and development, particularly with regard to their use as charms in medicine, marriage, and midwifery / [Walter J. Dilling]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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$daggers, keys, inkhorns, and actually books—which we hope were smaller than the tomes common in that age—dangled from them. For example, in a dialogue describing a lady’s dress, the mistress thus addresses her waiting-woman:— “ Give me my Girdle, and see that all the Furniture be at it: looke if my Cizers, the Pincers, the Pen-knife, the Knife to close Letters, with the Bodkin, the Ear-picker, and the Seale be in the Case.”1 Ultimately laws were introduced to stop these extra- vagances.'2 About 1600 the term “to turn the girdle” appears to have been a challenge, the buckle of the girdle being turned to the back of the wearer when a fight was about to ensue.3 Scotland seems also to have adopted the girdle at bygone times in its dress, thus, e.g., we find them used in Skye over two hundred years ago to support the plaid, and the inference would be that they were then, or had been, pretty general. “ The belt was of leather and of several pieces of silver intermixed with the leather like a chain. The lower end of the belt has a piece of plate about eight inches long and three in breadth curiously engraven, the end of which was adorned with fine stones or pieces of red coral.”4 Sufficient has been said to indicate the antiquity of the girdle in apparel; that it has been in general use by all nations is evident, and survivals of the girdles of olden times are to be found in European peoples who preserve their national dress, but to enter into this matter a lengthy treatise would be necessary.5 3. Girdles employed in religious ritual.—It has been stated that the origin of the dress girdle is obvious. This is by no means the case with the religious girdle, and, although it is possible to trace the religious use further back and still find attached to it some cryptic signification, it is, I think, most probable that the mystical attributes were applied to the already prevalent dress girdle. This, however, can meiely be a hypothesis, since the period in which the girdle tt . Ji‘ nran,d’ .PoF;lliU1\ Antiquities,” London, 1900, p. 374 : from “ In a Pl ouh harden, for English Ladyes and Gentlewomen to walke in,” 1621 3 cu iy' Bnt\\ eleventh edition, 1910, art. “Girdle,” vol. xii, p. 47. . Shakespeare, “Much Ado about Nothing,” act v, sc. 1, v 143 • M. Martin “Description of Western Islands of Scotland,” London, second edition, 1716, p. 209. ’ and mhL“' “Girdle” hy autl'“'in J- Hastines “ Eucyelop. of Religion$