Company of Empiric Artificers: What the Heck Are Roundhose?!?!!?

First off, I'm Dan. I'm the guy that isn't Chris that will be contributing to this blog. I'm a research nut and take every chance I can get to proselytize for using period materials and techniques to construct clothing. I figured it would be good to provide some historical background for the type of breeches that I made and that Chris is making.

"Hose" was the usual name for pants in 16th century England, though "breeches" was used as well. Like us, the Elizabethan people had several varieties of "hose" to choose from- many unfortunately unspecified in wills and inventories from the period outside of color and/or material. There were also several names for presumably the same or a similar sort of hose in the period, and many of these names may have been interchangeable (just as we can call a sweater a jumper, or a blouse a shirt, etc.). You may know roundhose better as trunkhose, though other names for them in primary sources include scaling hose, sliding hose, or when this kind of hose had vertical strips of fabric laid over the top paned hose or paneled hose. There are certainly a few more, but these are just a few examples. Many modern people authoritatively call this sort of hose "slops" (a name that comes up very very rarely in sources), or more frequently "pumpkin pants" - a name that makes me twitch (It's inauthentic to say the least). I should note that there were several other different styles of hose worn by the Elizabethans such as Venetian Hose and Gascon Hose or Galligaskins, but that's for another day.

Anyways, back to roundhose. Roundhose or Trunkhose can have panes (the vertical strips of fabric mentioned above), but don't necessarily- Those made by Chris and myself don't. They tend to end somewhere between just below the crotch and the mid-thigh (Who wears short-shorts? We wear short shorts...) based on artwork and extant garments, and were typically very full. Their fullness might be the result of being pleated or gathered into narrow waistbands and legbands, stuffing- called "bombast" in the period, or a combination of both. This sort of breeches might also have that triumph of archaic fashion- the codpiece! Codpieces tended to be much more tame than most people expect and were not meant to contain one's, to use a scholarly term, junk by the latter half of the 16th century. They would instead be stuffed to give the illusion of virility and constant attention. Codpieces were going out of fashion however, and by the late 16th century they had been almost completely phased out in new garments. Alternative methods of closure included a button fly or lacing shut, but they don't really have the same sort of charm- do they?

Here are some pictures featuring what are probably unpaned roundhose...

Here's an Englishman ca. 1568-69. He looks like he's had a busy day.

A French image from 1572. His hose have pockets! How exciting! (Yes, they had them by then- don't let anyone tell you otherwise)

Here's a peddler from somewhere between 1580 and 1600. His hose have canions, an occasional feature on roundhose/trunkhose (but rare on unpaned round/trunkhose until the very end of the century and the beginning of the 17th). They are close-fitting extensions of the breeches that might be of the same or a visually-related fabric. Yes, I know what his cap looks like.