JUDAICA - Wisdom In Torah

dress
fashions in dress than in the West. The first intervention of
the authorities occurred as early as the 13th century; a church
council held in Breslau in 1266 ordered the Jews in the bishopric
of Gnesen in western Poland to wear a special hat. Soon
the Council of Ofen (1279) specified the distinction to a greater
extent by requiring the Jews to wear a red badge. Late medieval
costumes seem to have been influenced by Central European
gentile and Jewish garb, like the dress cut like a kimono, called
a cotte, worn by men and women, the female kerchief, and the
Jewish conical hat worn by men. Later the Jews adopted from
the East their most characteristic garment – the caftan, which
is still in use in certain extreme Orthodox circles. This Persian
coat, cut open in the front, was so widely worn throughout
the Turkish Empire that it was found in Yemen and Morocco
under the same name. In the eastern areas of Poland and Russia
the caftan was girdled by a wide Oriental sash and in the
western regions by a cord.
Like other European regional costumes, the characteristic
Jewish dress evolved during the 16th century, incorporating
some features of the attire no longer worn by the Polish nobility
or upper classes. The authorities in several parts of Eastern
Europe reacted independently but with the same aim: to
restrict the splendor of Jewish costume and to preserve some
form of distinction. Thus the Piotrkow diet of 1538 reproved
the Jews for adopting Christian attire and compelled them to
wear a yellow hat. The Lithuanian statute of 1566, as well as the
southern Polish statutes of 1595, laid down minute specifications
restricting the sumptuousness of female dress and jewelry.
The Lithuanian statute ordered yellow hats to be worn
by men and yellow kerchiefs by women. On the other hand
in times of special calamity, like the *Chmielnicki massacres
(1648–49), the Jewish communities themselves imposed sober
dress on their members. In the 18th and 19th centuries the
Jews in Eastern Europe clung to their distinctive wear. Local
differences continued paramount; in Russia and Lithuania
clothes revealed an Oriental influence shown in the multicolored
silks of the women, the halfmoons printed on materials,
and an immense turban with three tails made of white
starched linen.
The most widely known garments worn by Jewish men
in Poland were the bekeshe and the kapote. The latter, both
in name and shape, was derived from the Persian caftan. The
kapote was generally made of very expensive cloth, such as
velvet or atlas (a glossy silk or satin). Besides a shirt, kneelength
trousers, and white stockings, the men also wore
velvet waistcoats (Yid. vestel or speneer), a black silk belt with
tassels called a gartel, and a small prayer shawl. Special headcoverings
were the skullcaps (Yid. keppel, yarmulke), the fur
hats (soibel-heet and streimel), the immense sable kolpak,
adopted from the Gentiles, and the fur-trimmed spodek (“saucer”)
with a plush base. Most of these types of clothing, as
well as female costumes, appear in the pictures and engravings
of Polish types drawn by several artists (Norblin, Le
Prince, Dave, Piwarski, Kilisinski, Kruszewski, Andrioli, and
Debucourt).
The most important item of clothing was the white
woolen prayer shawl, the tallit. Its central neckpiece (atarah)
was decorated with an appliqué of knit embroidery, executed
in flat, silver threads, in a style called by Polish Jews spanier
(“Spanish style”) or shikh, which was probably brought to Poland
by Jewish craftsmen from Spain during the reign of King
Sigismund Augustus. A similar type of Spanish embroidery
was also used on Torah curtains and Torah mantles.
WOMEN’S COSTUME FROM THE 18th TO THE BEGINNING
OF THE 20th CENTURY. Although the woman’s dress was
more colorful, her finery was not meant to be displayed outof-doors,
for it is written: “In all glorious things the king’s
daughter is within” (Ps. 45:14). However, the sumptuary decrees
regulating women’s clothing made an exception for the
Sabbath. The dress of the Jewish woman was generally in the
fashion of the period, but rather more subdued. The Jewish
woman of the late 18th and 19th centuries wore on top of her
dress a kind of bodice, the vestel or kamisol, usually made of
brocade with black passementerie trimmings. At a later stage
these trimmings were sewn on to the dresses themselves, or
even on to separate plastrons, called brust-tukh, brist-tikhel,
or bristekh. The brust-tukh was initially a wide strip of brocade
adorned with silver stitching and occasionally ornamented
with semiprecious stones. Later, this rectangular strip was
almost covered with silver stitching, but in the 20th century
it lost its regular shape and was made of velvet and adorned
with various trimmings. The very Orthodox woman always
wore an apron (Yid. fartekh or fartukh), usually trimmed
with lace, embroidery, and ribbons, and serving no practical
purpose.
WOMEN’S HEADDRESS. A distinctive form of headcovering
for Jewish women did not emerge until the 17th century. At
first the forms of headgear varied through the different regions
of the area. In western Poland during the 18th century, it was
customary to wear on the Sabbath a bonnet made of brocade
trimmed with lace and silver stitching. On the other hand, in
the east – Lithuania and parts of Russia – the earliest form
of headcovering consisted of lace trimmed with colored ribbons,
glass baubles, and beads. In time pearls and diamonds
gradually replaced the simpler popular ornaments, and not
only among rich women. In central Poland, Galicia, and Hungary
the headcovering was made up of three separate parts:
the harband, which covered the hair above the forehead; the
grint, which served as the background; and the kupke, made
of cloth or lace. Floral trimmings or ribbons were placed over
all three. The headdress for very Orthodox women had to be
made up from seven different parts assembled in strict order
(in an implicit reference to the seven species of crops).
The elaborate trimmings for these headcoverings were made
by an expert hat-trimmer called pitzikel (derived from putz,
“adornment”).
For the Sabbath a woman put on a sort of tiara, the binde,
consisting of two strips of velvet (recalling the two tablets of
the Law), decorated with gold chains, pearls, and diamonds.
16 ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 6