Joanna has been packing her nightie:
When I was packing to go on writing retreat — yippee! 😉 — I started thinking about what nightwear people wore in earlier times. Nowadays, lots of folk sleep naked. But then, most of us have central heating. In earlier centuries, bedrooms might be really cold, though I imagine the curtains round a four-poster bed would have helped.
Research rabbit hole beckons…
Intrigued, I did a quick search for “nightgown” in the V&A’s collection and the results surprised me. Many of the images were of what modern folk would call “dressing gowns”.
For men.
Like this one, dating from 1780-1820. It looks like daywear, doesn’t it? And, in fact, it sort of is, though it’s more complex than you’d think, from the picture.
This is what the V&A says about it:
“This nightgown is an example of one type of informal clothing worn by men in the 18th century. Nightgowns were worn over shirt and breeches, in the privacy of home before noon or late at night. They first appear in the male wardrobe in the mid-17th century, inspired by the kimonos given by the Japanese shoguns to the directors of the Dutch East India Company. … This example looks like a nightgown and waistcoat but it is one garment, with the waistcoat fronts stitched to the side seams of the gown. The waistcoat skirts recall the styles of the 1770s, while the high collar and revers (lapels) of the gown are in keeping with coat fashions of the early 19th century.”
I vaguely remembered some of that, but most of it was news to me. Encouragement to keep delving. Possibly for hours… (Even though I still haven’t finished packing. Sigh.)
Here’s another “nightgown” for men. It’s later, about 1830, made of French silk brocade with a velvet collar and cuffs.
I’d say this is more recognisable, from various costume dramas. The sort of thing that Mr Woodhouse wore, in Emma, perhaps? Probably with accompanying cap. While grumbling alongside the huge fire in summer?
Wrong rabbit hole! That’s not nightwear for bed…
“Nightdress” worked better as a search term but, unfortunately, all the images were of 20th century nighties. Not at all what I had in mind. “Night clothes” produced an image of a pattern for a lady’s nightcap, dating from 1826. (The V&A won’t let me download the image without a licence, sadly, but you can view it by following the link above.)
“Nightshirt”? Ah that’s better. Here’s a cartoon by George Woodward, dated 1807. It satirises the promotion of manners over morals. (Note the copy of “Chesterfield’s Letters” in the husband’s pocket. The Letters were taken as the model of polite behaviour. Yes, quite.)
On the question of nightwear, we can see that the man in the bed is wearing a nightshirt and has just taken off his red nightcap. The woman’s discarded stays, dress and shoes are lying on the floor. She herself is hidden from view, apart from her nightcap, with pink ribbon. And isn’t it interesting that a woman committing adultery bothers with a nightcap?
Nightshirts for men changed very little until the new fashion for pyjamas towards the end of the 19th century. The V&A collection includes a pristine nightshirt from 1874 which looks very like the one in the Woodward cartoon.
What about nightwear for women?
Believe it or not, this French print from 1755 shows a lady in her dressing gown, viewing goods offered by La Marchande de Modes. The print is by René Gaillard, after François Boucher.
At this point, I abandoned the V&A collection and turned to my trusty copy of The History of Underclothes by C Willett and Phyllis Cunnington. Basically, what women wore in bed, in the later 18th and the first half of the 19th centuries, was a longer version of the chemise they wore in the daytime. Plus a nightcap. Plain and practical nightwear, it seems.
This Rowlandson print below, from 1791, shows both male and female versions. And, even though the characters are ranting about the damp sheets, they still have their nightcaps on.
The idea that a nightdress (or négligée) might be made attractive, even seductive, by the addition of such fripperies as lace trimmings or insertions was seen as a sign of depravity to some in the 19th century, according to the Cunningtons.
So nightwear should not be attractive?
Really? That’s not how Georgette Heyer describes such a garment in Venetia:
Venetia now had leisure to observe that the foam of lace and gauze in which she was wrapped was in reality a dressing-gown. It was not at all the sort of garment one would have expected one’s mama to wear, for it was as improper as it was pretty. Venetia wondered whether Damerel would like the sight of his bride in just such a transparent cloud of gauze, and was strongly of the opinion that he would like it very much.
Continuing the subject of dressing gowns, I’ll finish with an extract from the end of Lady of Quality. Annis Wychwood is recovering from a severe bout of flu. She is wearing a splendid new satin dressing gown, with blue posies embroidered all over it and a lace fichu. Nothing plain and practical there. Oliver Carleton, her outspoken and outrageous suitor, insists on visiting her. In her bedchamber. At Oliver’s urging, Annis has just agreed to drink some burgundy when her tiresome and prissy companion interrupts:
…Miss Farlow burst into the room, powerfully agitated, stopped dead on the threshold, and exclaimed: “Well!”
Miss Wychwood was startled into spilling some of the burgundy. She set her glass down, and tried to rub away the stains from the skirt of her gown with her handkerchief, saying crossly: “Really, Maria, it is too bad of you! Look what you have made me do! What do you want?”
“I am here, Annis, to preserve you from the consequences of your own folly!” said Miss Farlow. “How could you receive a member of the Male Sex in your bedchamber, and in your dressing-gown? Sir, I must request you to leave immediately!”
“You don’t mean to tell me that’s a dressing-gown?” interrupted Mr Carleton, a dangerous gleam in his eyes. “Well, it’s by far the most elegant one I’ve ever been privileged to see, and I suppose I must have seen scores of ’em in my time—paid for them too!”
Fascinating! I love the quotes and cartoons you have chosen, too.
Glad you enjoyed it, Lorna.
A great post! Another interesting thing about the first cartoon is that the man in bed appears to have a shaved head. Did that put off lice? Might they have stayed on the surface of the wig (and fallen off, disillusioned), rather than making it as far as the scalp?
Thanks, Christina. Some men may have had shaven or close-cropped heads under their wigs. I assume it made the wig sit better on the head? The man in the earlier cartoon definitely has hair under his nightcap, though, and at that period he would almost certainly have worn a wig in the daytime.