Everyone is familiar with the
stereotypical ancient Egyptian. Their wonderful lack of detail in art has
resulted in an image of a ‘funny guy walking sideways’ in popular consciousness.
This (arguably) simplistic style has its drawbacks- when attempting to
reconstruct the clothing worn by the Egyptians, it becomes incredibly
difficult.
 |
| The Ancient Egyptians: Incapable of Looking Forwards |
With every society, you can tell a
lot about someone’s social status by the clothes they wear. This was no less
true for Egypt, where the small elite could dress in fabrics of their choice,
while the poor may have worn loincloths, and slaves may have worn nothing at
all. Nevertheless, most clothing for all members of society appears to have
been made from only one or two pieces of fabric, knotted together as the wearer
desired.
Women are often depicted in
tightfitting white dresses, known as a kalasaris.
This simple garment was the typical dress for any Egyptian woman, usually a
tunic held up by one or two pieces of fabric. Realistically, these dresses
would not have been as tight as they appear on tomb and temple walls. The Egyptians
had a fantastic sense of simplicity when approaching their art, believing it
didn’t have to appear realistic, so long as there was a good amount of
symbolism behind it. Thus, to paraphrase one lecturer I have had, of course
women were depicted in tight dresses, or if you couldn’t see their breasts, how
would you know they were women?
 |
| Some Women, in the tight Kalasaris |
Men could wear tunics as well, but
fabulously preceding the Scottish in fashion sense, also wore kilts. The stiff triangular
appearance of the kilt in most art makes it hard to imagine what it may have looked
like when worn. By the New Kingdom (c.1500-1000 BCE) some more defined imagery suggests it likely had more
material and layers, but again, the Egyptians drew what they liked rather than
what they saw, and thus we are left with wall paintings of men in very pointy
skirts.
 |
| Honestly- Who wore it better? |
Almost all our remaining
depictions of Egyptian clothes suggests they were white, though this by no
means assures us white was the only colour the Egyptians wore. It was certainly
an important colour, and perhaps the most common, but black, representing the
mud in the fertile Nile valley, was also worn. Red was perhaps less common, due
to associations with Seth (the god of destruction and chaos). The tomb of
Nebamun, a New Kingdom official, has some wonderfully vibrant images, depicting
women in luxurious golden cloth, which certainly suggests there was some variation
on white, at least in elite dress.
 |
| Beautiful Golden Clothing in the Tomb of Nebamun |
I don’t want to dive into hair at
the moment- I feel it is a broad topic which fully deserves its own post or
series of posts (though I will shamelessly plug another blog I write for, whichhas an interesting section on Egyptian Beards). Jewellery, and particularly
magic amulets, is another topic I would like to explore in more depth than is
afforded in one post. Therefore I will end here for now, and hopefully talk
more about accessories and hair styles when I have had a chance to do more
research!
Image References
https://hermionesknapsack.wordpress.com/tag/egyptian/
https://uk.pinterest.com/malatk23/the-ancient-middle-east-chapter-2/
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Nebamun_tomb_fresco_dancers_and_musicians.png
http://nationalclothing.org/16-nationalclothing/europe/scotland/9-national-dress-of-scotland-men-s-and-ladies-kilt.html
https://uk.pinterest.com/karmenradjenovi/egypt/
Bibliography:
Condra, J. (ed.) 2008. The Greenwood Encyclopedia of Clothing through World History, Volume 1. Westport, CN and London
Nicholson, P.T and Shaw, I. (eds.) 2000. Ancient Egyptian Materials and Technology. Cambridge.
Tierney, T. 1999. Egyptian Fashions. Mineola, NY.
