Female Underwear - A short history |
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 Female underwear is and was to all times associated with eroticism, often enough to a pathological extent. This might be the reason why only few historians worked on this issue.The truth is that there were always multiple functions of underwear: 1. Protection of the body from the cold Women wore through centuries lots of petticoats to prevent them from cold and illness - women's thighs were bare until the nineteenth century! 2. Support the shape of the costume Female costume has appeared in almost any outline over the centuries - and this was possible due to all kinds of constructions underneath. 3. Cleanliness Prevent the body from dirty outerwear as well as prevent outerwear from the dirty body - in times when bathing was very rarely performed! 4. Erotic purposes For centuries - especially in puritanian periods and countries - it was an erotic gesuture to reveal parts of the underwear, such as the top of a bodice, or the laces at the slip or simply a part of the stockings. Sometimes the bodice of the evening wardrobe has been (and still is)designed to look like the corsets and to suggest that the lady is only incompletely dressed. Often undergarments were designed withe rotic symbols, such as hearts, arrows, roses... or of semitransparent fabric. 5. Class distinction (source: The history of underclothes - C. Willet and Phillis Cunnington) Finding vintage or antique underwear in good shape is like a story from the past - and we can use it nowadays as outerwear - either for special occasions or as a costume - or just for fun! |
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