#auguste racinet

[dresshistorynerd]

Hei! What's your opinion about "The costume history" by Auguste Racinet? I assume that you're probably familiar with it, because it was published in 1888 and still gets reprinted. But because it's so old I'm not sure if it's actually good source about fashion history or if it's more about mindset of the time. I fully expect that anything that deals with different cultures that was written in 1800s will be racists and moralising, but I wonder about factual accuracy when it comes to clothes.

I would encourage to take it with a grain or perhaps many grains of salt, especially the non-western clothing. Generally speaking illustrations made after the time they depict as well as non-western clothing depicted by colonizers, should always be approached with cation. Books that recount the whole western dress history should be approached with cation and this book claims to depict the complete costume history, not just western. Also books written before dress history became it's own academic field separate from art history, should also be approached with cation, and this definitely was written before that.

I will say, the illustrations from Auguste Racinet are not the worst I've seen.They do look like they are based on art and illustration from the period they depict. I have not read his book, but I have come across the illustrations from them many times, so I'm just speaking about the illustrations I've seen. Despite there being worst illustrations out there from Victorian era, these too have some glaring issues, especially the periods earlier from history. Victorians hated the codpiece, thinking it was vulgar and indecent, so in these illustrations none of the men's costumes from the Renaissance have them. Even the depiction of Late Medieval joined hose lack a codpiece, even though it would have been impossible for the hose to be so skintight without a codpiece.

This Late Medieval page also has issues with the women's dresses, which are in many ways inaccurate and they resemble most dresses from the previous century compared to the men's dresses next to them. All of the depictions of pre-1800s clothing tend to have a lot of issues with their details. I think there's also major issues with the framing. There's just several different dresses, which might be from different decades, even centuries like in the example above. I'm not sure if there's context in the text itself, but these illustrations don't at least have any context for who and in which situations used a specific garment. No book that tries to tell even the whole western costume history, can give all the needed context, but I doubt the text here can give even less of that.

I'm not going to evaluate the accuracy of the illustrations of non-western dress that are available easily, because I don't know enough of non-western dress history that I would be able to confidently do that. But I'm imagining the issues there's with the depictions of western historical dress are similar but much worse with the non-western dress. Even if he used extant garments and primary source images to draw those illustrations, I'm willing to bet he knew even less of those cultures than he knew about European Renaissance and Late Middle Ages. He would then understand even less of the context the clothes he depicted belonged to, what details were important, how were they constructed, worn, and by whom and in what situations. If he wanted to copy them exactly, he'd have put those illustrations, paintings and other primary source images to his book, but he didn't and because he certainly lacked understanding of them, his illustrations will have some flaws. And who knows how many things he deemed unsavory or indecent he omitted or changed, like he did with the codpiece.

Still I will say, even a book like this can have some use. If there's very little better source images available of some type of dress from 1800s (for example often applies to indigenous dress), these type of illustrations can be used to help piece together the fuller image of that dress, while keeping in mind the potential flaws and issues with these depictions.

[chiropteracupola]

drawing will have you say sentences like 'how do normal people just stand there'

[clawmarks]

L'Ornement polychrome - Auguste Racinet - vol. 1, c.1890 - via Gallica

[miapcain]

Study of Vesna dressed in a red shift and mid 14th century noblewoman's dress with slashed sleeves, and curled braids. After a piece by Auguste Racinet. Gouache, black ink and red ink

[arrgh-whatever]

Do you have any favorite sources for learning about medieval things? I just recently got into doing research of that period for my own project and it is daunting for sure and hard to pick out what is nonsense sometimes

Sure!

I don't know in what part of the Medieval Ages you're interested but will give a few sources that'll be a good start.

✸ Medieval Chronicles

Basically a medieval Wikipedia (with a pretty awful title font) which means that it won't tell you much but will be able to give some basic knowledge you can base you further research on.

✸ Advice for time traveling to medieval Europe

A very nice video with plenty of facts about Medieval Life. VERY good for worldbuilding since it tells you about Medieval Life from the perspective of you being there. (It also has a few good book recommendations in description.)

✸ Matt Easton of Schola Gladiatoria

An incredible YouTube channel with all sorts of videos about (not only) Medieval Military History.

✸ Festival of Archaeology 2020

A few amazing videos about Medieval Crafts.

✸ The Castle Builders

Documentaries about Medieval Castles.

✸ The Medieval Feast

And a documentary about Medieval Feast from the same YouTube channel.

(Note that as far as I know most of the information that we have on Medieval Recipes we have from Nobility since poor were not able to record them. So a lot of information you'll find on Medieval Eating might not be applicable to all classes.)

✸ For clothes, jewelry and decorative ornaments I usually use

"The Costume History" by Auguste Racinet

"The World of Ornament" by Auguste Racinet & Auguste Dupont-Auberville

Just like Medieval Chronicles it doesn't have a lot of detailed information on the period but points out important parts and has lots of examples.

✸ I personally don't make the world of Forest Manuscripts extremely historically accurate for the sake of storytelling.

For example I have a few smoking characters and tobacco wasn't introduced to Europe until the 16th century which is a bit later.

Before you break some rules it is important to know history but yeah breaking rules is totally fine unless it's a documentary thing!

[kevinvoncrastenburg]

VTMB - Painting Since there was a bit of a request lately I decided to share this little painting I made for TS3. The inspiration came from Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines where this particular painting can be seen at the Red Dragon restaurant in Chinatown. I'm sure you can see it in other buildings as well but that's where I found it originally. The frame is a EA/ Maxis mesh and is still recolorable. (Base game compatible since 04/18/24) I hope you enjoy it. 🥰 Download: SFS

Credits: - EA/ Maxis for the frame - Albert Charles Auguste Racinet, the original artist of the painting that was used in VTMB - @nantucketupsnott for letting me know about this game and for using my creation in their recent build. 😊

[rogerriddle]

Charles Auguste Albert Racinet was a French illustrator and cultural historian in the 1800s. In his book "Polychrome Ornament" his created examples of art works and patterns to show what the art of different cultures was like from ancient art, through time, to the 18th century, he later released a second edition that included examples of the 19th century as well. In this example, from the English translation of the book, he shows examples of ancient patterns seen throughout many different cultures around the world.

[cawe-sama]

@hetalia-rarepairweek is back!!

Day one, going with the "royalty" prompt and my beloved EgyPrus <3

Clothes + throne reference taken from "The costume history" by Auguste Racinet (of course ✨✨)

Btw this year I asked a friend (who doesn't know Hetalia) to choose the ships for me, so there will be more ships I don't often draw! I hope you'll enjoy my art throughout the event :D

[smithsonianlibraries]

Illustrations of medieval outfits from Auguste Racinet’s Le costume historique v.4 (1888).

Full text with many other colorful illustrations available here.

[alchemy-fic]

My book wishlist!

Egyptian Magic by E.A. Wallis Budge (1901)

Magic of the Ordinary: Recovering the Shamanic in Judaism by Gershon Winkler, David Carson (2003)

Ashkenazi Herbalism: Rediscovering the Herbal Traditions of Eastern European Jews by Deatra Cohen, Adam Siegel (2021)

Jewish Magic and Superstition: A Study in Folk Religion by Joshua Trachtenberg (1939)

Ancient Jewish Magic: A History by Gideon Bohak (2008)

The Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic & Mysticism: Second Edition by Geoffrey W. Dennis (2007)

The Green Mysteries: An Occult Herbarium by Daniel A Schulke, Benjamin A Vierling (2023)

Reading Sumerian Poetry (Athlone Publications in Egyptology & Ancient Near Eastern Studies) by Jeremy Black (2001)

The Literature of Ancient Sumer by Jeremy Black, Graham Cunningham (2006)

Handbook to Life in Ancient Mesopotamia by Stephen Bertman (2002)

Weavers, Scribes, and Kings: A New History of the Ancient Near East by Amanda H. Podany

Auguste Racinet. The Costume History (Bibliotheca Universalis) by Françoise Tétart-Vittu

The Arthur of the Welsh: The Arthurian Legend in Medieval Welsh Literature by Rachel Bromwich (2009)

The Complete Dead Sea Scrolls in English: Seventh Edition (Penguin Classics) by Geza Vermes

Thomas Aquinas: Selected Writings (Penguin Classics) by Thomas Aquinas, Ralph McInerny

The Treasures of Darkness: A History of Mesopotamian Religion by Thorkild Jacobsen

The Tibetan Book of the Dead: First Complete Translation (Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition) by Graham Coleman, Thupten Jinpa

The Egyptian Book of the Dead (Penguin Classics) by Wallace Budge, John Romer

History Begins at Sumer: Thirty-Nine Firsts in Recorded History by Samuel Noah Kramer (1981)

The Sumerians: Their History, Culture, and Character (Phoenix Books) by Samuel Noah Kramer

Welsh Witchcraft: A Guide to the Spirits, Lore, and Magic of Wales by Mhara Starling

An Annotated Sumerian Dictionary by Mark E. Cohen

A Sumerian Chrestomathy by Konrad Volk

Toward the Image of Tammuz and Other Essays on Mesopotamian History and Culture by Thorkild Jacobsen

Early Mesopotamia by Nicholas Postgate

Amulets and Talismans by E. A. Wallis Budge

Mundane Astrology by Michael Baigent, Campion, Nicholas, Harvey, Charles

[vooruitmariek]

Based on 14th Century Northern France dress & 14th-15th Century French nobility dress

Source: Le Costume Historique - Auguste Racinet

[bonesandthebees]

WAIT is that Auguste Racinet’s “The Costume History”???? bc i literally have that book on my desk rn

- 💜

yes it is!! my mom got it for me recently when she noticed how into fashion history I was and it's been very useful :)

[clawmarks]

L'Ornement polychrome - Auguste Racinet - vol. 2, c.1890 - via Gallica

[love1kimono]

Auguste Racinet, Histoire du Costume

Thanks to Patricia of Agence Eureka blog. Merci!

[arrgh-whatever]

What are some good places to look for manuscript style inspiration?

✸ Victoria and Albert Museum's Gallery

Contains lots of examples with descriptions. Sorted by Place of Origin, Material, Type, Time, etc.

✸ "The World of Ornament" by Auguste Racinet & Auguste Dupont-Auberville

Also contains a lot of examples of ornaments from Illuminated Manuscripts. Also sorted by Place of Origin, Type and Time.

✸ Alternatively you can search:

Book of Hours - Illuminated Christian prayer books. They were one of the most common types of Illuminated Manuscripts so you should be able to find lots of examples

Book of Kells - Celtic Gospel Book in Insular Style

Westminster Abbey Bestiary - 13th century Manuscript that contains lots of Animal Depictions

The Morgan Bible (or Crusade Bible) - 13th century Illuminated Manuscript made in France with illustrated events from Old Testament.

✸ And just some generally useful information:

What are Illuminated Manuscripts (who and why were making them)

A process of making an Illuminated Manuscripts (that for some reason ends with a cheese documentary)

Types of Decorative Features in Illuminated Manuscripts

[catboyrightsdefender]

obsessed with this fit i found in auguste racinet's complete costume history