Materializing Resistant Identities Among the Medieval Peasantry

Abstract

This article examines metal dress accessories from a range of late medieval English rural settlement sites. It is argued at the outset that medieval archaeology has been very slow to consider the concept of resistance when interrogating the material culture of the peasantry and that items of dress are particularly amenable to such consideration given the close relationship between personal appearance and social power in this period. The dress accessories from seven excavated sites are investigated and interpreted as revealing the use of `infra-political' power by members of the medieval peasantry as they deployed this aspect of their material lives in re-fashioning and resisting the identities imposed on them by the medieval elite.

Late Medieval Dress Accessories in Rural Communities in Central-Eastern Europe

“…In the literature consulted, attitudes towards the value of dress accessories seem to vary. In England (Egan & Pritchard, 2002;Smith, 2009;Jervis, 2017) and the Netherlands (Willemsen, 2009(Willemsen, , 2012, items of non-precious metals are generally considered to be cheap and mass-produced, whereas in central Europe, and especially in the older literature, even bronze dress accessories are considered to be more significant (Krabath, 2001;Wachowski, 2002;Janowski & Wywrot-Wyszkowska, 2017). This divergence seems to be mostly due to the state of research and the sheer number of finds: in England and Wales, documentation on such finds is now is accessible through the PAS portal (finds.…”

“…Unlike buckles, strap ends seem to be much more expensive. In late medieval iconography, peasants are shown wearing simple belts with buckles only (Smith, 2009: 325, fig. 5 A & B).…”

“…In the early days of the PAS, Geoff Egan compared finds from urban and rural areas and concluded, somewhat surprisingly, that there was little difference between these assemblages (Egan, 2007). Since then, some more publications have focused on this or similar aspects (Smith, 2009;Hinton, 2010;Wheeler, 2012;Cassels, 2013;Lewis, 2016;Jervis, 2017). It is worth noting that since the early 2000s, the dataset from the PAS has greatly increased and provided more information about the material culture in rural areas (Lewis, 2016).…”

“…These sources usually refer only to the most valuable specimens, which are absent in archaeological assemblages, except for rare finds of treasure hoards. Moreover, research on dress accessories from rural areas is very rarely noted by archaeologists and historians (for a British perspective, see Smith, 2009;Jervis, 2017), mostly because the evidence is scarce. Most of the data available in central Europe come from large urban centres.…”

‘Saide Monstrous Hose’: Compliance, Transgression and English Sumptuary Law to 1533

“…76 One gold fi nger ring was discovered at a Tudor-era site, but gold rings were permitted. 77 Artisans, yeomen, husbandmen and merchants all received similar treatment and were placed into similar categories within the various iterations of English sumptuary law.…”