18th – 19th Century Seals For Letters and Posting. Used to seal hand written letters in the 18th and 19th centuries.
Definition: Wax Seals: Pressed onto a letter or envelope to show that a document is unopened or to verify the sender’s identity. A signet ring or was seal is pressed into a dollop of hot wax to seal a letter or envelope closed.
1806 April Two Ladies In Full Dress, English. Loose pink robe of undressed crepe over a dress of white satin, or sarsnet, embroidered with silver, sleeves plain and embroidered to correspond with dress. Round dress of fine muslin over white sarsnet. Broad lace let in down front and bottom. Bosom plain, trimmed with quilling of lace, ornamented with medallion or brooch. Long silk shawl, ends embroidered in colors. Tiara of silver or steel, adorned with gems. Fashion Plate via Fashions of London and Paris, Published By Richard Phillips, St. Paul’s Church Yard, London, UK.
Dress Full Dress: The most formal and complete ensemble, worn for day or night events, and includes the fullest range of accessories that could be added to the outfit to make the most impressive display.
Fabric Sarsnet: Also spelled ‘sarcenet’, is a lightweight silk that was often woven with small-scale decorative designs.
1800s White Evening Dress. Long train on the dress, gold sash, evening hair style, and carrying a fan. via The Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.
Definition Empire Style Dress: Named after the First Empire in France. Empire dresses had a low neckline and skirts started directly under the bust and flowed into the classical relaxed wide styles of Greece and Rome. This style of dress is associated with Jane Austen and her contemporaries as a high-waisted dress was worn most days. Cotton, silk or taffeta were the popular fabrics. Only the very wealthy could afford white dress in this style as the cottons were imported from India and had to be carefully cleaned, usually by a lady’s maid.
1802 Blue Riding Habit, French. Lady in a riding costume with a black fitted hat and a whip. Fashion Plate via Journal des Dames et des Modes, or Costume Parisien. Typical of the riding costumes worn by Jane Austen’s female contemporaries. The style is still in the Empire fashion of a high-waist with the skirt falling from just under the bust and worn under a matching short jacket or Spencer.
1811 April Waking Dress, English. Round dress of white cambric muslin with a ruff collar, trimmed round the bottom with narrow purple ribbon, cashmere crimson mantle confined close to the back and lined with purple silk, embroidered round the neck, cape, and sides with purple fancy border, deep cape falling from the shoulders, sloping to a narrow point, with tassels. Crimson velvet bonnet, turban front, and trimmed with purple to correspond. York tan gloves. Yellow kid boots. Fashion Plate via John Belle’s La Belle Assemblée or, Bell’s Court and Fashionable Magazine, London.
1808 January 1st Drawing from Life at the Royal Academy, Somerset House, London, U.K. The Royal Academy would have held art classes like this in London during Jane Austen’s time. Designed and etched by Thomas Rowlandson. Via Wikimedia Commons. commons.wikimedia.org
1802 Pianoforte By John Broadwood. Square form, pale mahogany case with ebony wood stringing throughout. Inscribed ‘1802 John Broadwood and Sons, Makers to his Majesty and the Princesses, Great Pulteney Street, Golden Square, London.’ via Sotheby’s Auctions. ~ sothebys.com
Definition Piano- Forte: Well-known stringed and keyed instrument of German origin, so called from its equal command both of softness and strength. Its principal advantage over the harpsichord is its capacity of obeying the touch so the performer can vary the expressions and strike lights and shades. Jane Austen and her contemporaries played the pianoforte to entertain family and guests.
1811 Typical Regency Era Man’s Overcoat or Driving Coat. Fashion Plate via Journal des Dames et des Modes, or Costume Parisien. Overcoats were called many names: Greatcoat, Carrick or Garrick Coat, Coachman’s or Driving Or Box Coat. With many shoulder capes, or pelerines, to keep rain and snow off the body.
The London To Louth Royal Mail, England, U.K. Print by Charles Cooper Henderson. (1803-1877)
How did Jane Austen and her family? Did they go by stagecoach? The dreadful condition of British roads caused great apprehension to all classes of travelers. Making a journey anywhere in the country was a big undertaking and often a gentleman composed his last will and testament before his departure. Traveling in vehicles was only possible during the day or on the nights with very bright moonlight with few vehicles attempting road travel in winter and any travel on a Sunday was frowned upon. books2read.com/SuziLoveTravel
Description of Stage Coach Travel in England. via 1815 Journal Tour of Great Britain. “The gentlemen coachmen, with half-a dozen great coats about them, immense capes, a large nosegay at the button-hole, high mounted on an elevated seat, with squared elbows, a prodigious whip, beautiful horses, four in hand, drive in a file to Salthill, a place about twenty miles from London, and return, stopping in the way at the several public-houses and gin-shops where stage-coachmen are in the habit of stopping for a dram, and for parcels and passengers on the top of the others as many as seventeen persons. These carriages are not suspended, but rest on steel springs, of a flattened oval shape, less easy than the old mode of leathern braces on springs. Some of these stage coaches carry their baggage below the level of the axletree.”
1812 June Couple In Fashionable Jane Austen style Walking Dress, English. Lady wears a green cape and hat over a high-waisted, or Empire style, white dress with a pink parasol. Man wears a tailcoat over fawn breeches,
yellow gloves, black shoes and hat and a walking stick. Fashion Plate via The Lady’s Magazine Or Entertaining Companion for the Fair Sex.
By the end of the 18th century, tailored garments for both men and women were replaced by styles made for ease and comfort, resulting in the neoclassical style of the 1780s. Inspired in part by the statuary of ancient Greece and Rome, the new fashion was epitomized by light cotton gowns falling around the body in an unstructured way, held around the high waist with a simple sash and accompanied by a soft shawl draped around exposed shoulders. This style was ideal for the Indian imports like Kashmiri shawls and Bengali muslin, as used in this embroidered gown.
