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Excerpt
from
ACCESSORIES OF
DRESS
By Katherine
Morris Lester and Bess Viola Oerke
Chapter
33
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The
fan, like the sunshade, originated in tropical
countries. Here it was in daily service as a
protection against the sun, as
a means of cooling the air, driving away bothers
insects and, when necessary, fanning the fire into
a flame. In the Far East the fan was
extensively
employed
in the service of religion, but its use as a
costume accessory also dates back to remote
antiquity. Some authorities state that the fan was
known in China three thousand years ago. The
Egyptians, Assyrians, Persians, Hebrews, Chinese,
Japanese, and the people of India used fans as far
back as their records of history go.
Among
Eastern potentates, the fan was a badge of rank.
The dignity of
these rulers required that their fans be carried by
slaves or attendants. The
ancient form of the fan is therefor pictured with a
long handle, and
resembles a standard. Figure 529 A wall  painting at Thebes
pictures
twenty-three sons of Rameses the Great in a
procession, each carrying a ceremonial fan of
semicircular shape attached to a long staff. The
office of fan bearer to an Egyptian king was one of
high honor, one to which only princes and other
sons of the highest nobility could aspire. Figure
529. These attendants served standing at the right
and left of the monarch as he sat in state; they
attended him when he rode forth and during
ceremonies in the temple. When not serving in the
capacity of the fan bearer, they waited upon the
king as members of his staff or in some other
service of distinction.
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Another
ancient record of the fan is seen in an Assyrian
bas-relief, now in the British Museum. This
pictures a king of 880-860 B.C. being fanned by
attendants. Figure 530. A Persian relief likewise
represents the king of that country seated on his
throne with attendants behind him bearing fans. In
China, at the palace of Peking, a number of fans
sawed from ivory are exhibited which date from
about 1000 B.C. They have handles of gold and
silver filigree combined with mother-of-pearl. It
is the Chinese, in fact, who claim to have invented
the fan, and they trace its origin to legendary
sources. According to the tale, Langsen, the
daughter of an all-powerful mandarin, was present
at the Feast of Lanterns. About to succumb from the
heat, she broke all traditions by removing the
mask, which she wore. She held it near enough,
however, to hide her features, waving it rapidly to
and fro. Immediately, says legend, this caprice set
the fashion of fans.
Europe
acquired the fan from the East. Ancient Greek
writers often refer to fans, and illustrations of
fans may be seen on Greek vases. Figure 531. Here,
as in oriental countries, the large fans with long
handles were usually carried by slaves in the
service of their masters. In Orestes, the words of
the Phrygian slave affirm: "I fanned Helen’s
cheeks and airy curls with a winged fan of round
and graceful shape" – Euripides,
Orestes
However,
small fans carried by Greek women occasionally
appear in vase paintings. About 500 B.C. the fan
made of peacock feathers was in use. Some of these
were probably only a tuft of feathers set in a
handle; others no doubt were arranged so that their
color and markings formed a pattern. The peacock
was known as the bird of Hera (Juno, to the Romans)
and was held as a symbol of refinement and luxury;
hence it is not difficult to understand the Grecian
woman’s preference for the fan of peacock
feathers. During the late centuries, fans were made
by stretching linen or silk over a frame shaped
like a leaf. According to Winckelmann, the first
fans in imitation of leaves were triangular in
shape. They were inspired, without doubt, by the
palm leaf and other fronds, which had been used in
earliest times and had furnished the original
idea.
Roman
authorities refer to the fan as being of service in
keeping away the flies. Their fans continued the
curved leaf shape but were made of thin, delicately
carved wood elaborately gilded and painted. The
patrician woman of Rome was provided with slaves
who attended her as fan bearers, for no highborn
lady was even to be suspected fanning herself. We
hear, however, that later Roman beauties carried
their own fans. For general cooling of the air
within the lofty apartments of the Roman villas,
great bunches of ostrich plumes tinted in various
colors were suspended from gilded ceilings.
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Middle Ages
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In
Western Europe during the Middle Ages nothing is
heard of the fan in the everyday life of the
people, and the inference is that it had
disappeared. The old ceremonial use, however,
coming down from the ancients, was kept alive in
the churches. The long-handled, disk-shaped fan was
held by the deacons and used by them to drive away
insects from the sacramental vessels. In the early
inventories, the flabellum, this large fan carried
by church attendants, is frequently mentioned as
used in this service. These ceremonial fans were
radial in form, with long handles. The fan proper
was made of various materials, feathers, parchment,
silk, and wood; many of them could be folded, a la
cocarde, and resembled the wheel-shaped fan of
later days. One of the most famous of these early
fans is that from the Abbey of Tournus, dating from
the ninth century and now preserved in the National
Museum of Florence. Figure 532. This remarkable
example is formed of a strip of vellum folded a la
cocarde. It is painted on both sides. The outer
border consists of a continuous scroll of
Romanesque ornament. Inscriptions in Latin fill in
the three concentric circles. Figures of the saints
separated by little conventional trees fill the
second large space. The handle is formed by four
cylinders of white bone. The two larger pieces are
ornamented by semi-naturalistic foliage and running
spirals; the two lower are fluted. The cylinders
are joined by pommels painted green. The upper one
supports a capital with four figures of saints. On
the capital rests the long guard or box, which
receives the fan when closed. The four sides are
white bone elaborately carved. This famous
specimen, one of the few which has been preserved,
may be regarded as a characteristic type of the
ancient flabellum.
The
gradual reappearance of the fan in Europe during
the early thirteenth and fourteenth centuries was
due to the many unique examples of Eastern fans
brought into the country by returning Crusaders.
Japan is credited with having invented the folding
fan about 670 A.D. In the tenth century it was
introduced into China, and from there it
undoubtedly reached Europe. Authorities disagree as
to which of the European countries first introduced
it, though a general feeling exists that Italy was
probably the leader.
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Among
the earliest records of fans are the esmouchoirs or
"fly whisks." This particular type of fan seems to
have been employed for the same purpose as the
modern fly brush – so generally used in
Egypt-to keep away insects. Figure 533. Following
the flywhisk there probably came the fly fan, that
is a fixed fan with the blade set firmly in a
handle. Proof of these fly fans in the fourteenth
century is contained in a record of 1316 in which
it is stated that the Countress Mahant
d’Artois had a "fly-fan of cloth of gold
fleur-de-lis ornamented with the arms of France and
Navarre, with a bastion of ivory and jet valued in
the will of Jeanne d’Evereau. An inventory of
Charles V of France (1364-80) records a "fan of
round form which folds." These two types, the fixed
fan and the folding, wheel-shaped or cockade fan
were the earliest forms in use on the continent.
These were in the possession only of the wealthy
and may not have been considered a part of personal
costume, for they were always carried by servants
or used as part of the furnishings of private
chapels. Fans did not become a distinct part of
costume until milady carried her own fan in her own
hand. This came to be general in the early
sixteenth century. Miniatures of this period begin
to show women with long-handled, disk-shaped fan,
tuft fans, and a little flag fan.
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1500-1600
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The
flag fan, the long-handled, disk-shaped fan, and
the tuft fan were in use in the fourteenth century
and even earlier. Figures 534,535,536. The tuft fan
had been in use as early as the twelfth century. In
the sixteenth century these were made of the
plumage of the ostrich and peacock dyed various
colors, with feathers varying in number from one to
twenty. Sometimes feathers were arranged in
overlapping series suggesting their natural growth.
They were set in beautiful handles of carved ivory,
gold, or silver, frequently richly jeweled. Figure
537. These costly handles were a very important
item of permanent value. The feathers, vellum, or
parchment were less durable, and could be replaced
from time to time. For the folding fans, which
appeared later, the precious metals were not so
suitable and consequently ivory, bone, tortoise
shell, and mother-of-pearl come to be the popular
materials for sticks.
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The flag fan,
sometimes called the "key" or "weather vane" fan, Figure
534, seems to have been in use during the earlier centuries.
Its form had undoubtedly come from the East, where a similar
type was in use. It was during the early sixteenth century
that it came to be very fashionable in Italy, particularly
in Venice. This was a fixed fan of oblong shape with the
handle attached to one long edge. The blade was made of
plaited straw of various colors, of linen painted or
embroidered, of parchment, vellum, or silk. Figure 538. The
more ornate of these were carried by matrons, while newly
married women or those betrothed carried flag fans of a
dainty whiteness. Since the popularity of these fans were
largely limited to Italy, they are always associated with
the fashions of this country, Lavinia, the daughter of
Titian, in her portrait as a young girl (1550) carries a
flag fan; some years later she is pictured with a feathered
fan, significant of venetian nobility. Figure 540. In
several famous portraits both Titian and Veronese have each
preserved the exact type of flag fan.
In 1550 screen
fans, which resembled the disk fan, reached France. These
were called "screen fans" because they served admirably as a
screen, shielding the eyes of the fair bearer from the hot
rays of Parisian sunshine. Many of these resembled a folding
fan but did not fold. They were spread in deep, permanent
pleats. During the same period Catherine de0Medici brought
the new folding fan from Italy into France. These fans of
heavily scented leather coming from the Orient had been in
use from some time in Spain and reached the continent
through that country.
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The
earliest form of folding fan used in Italy was
probably the so-called "duck’s foot" fan, so
popular with the ladies of Ferrara. Figure 538.
This opened only a quarter of a circle, and instead
of being made of leather it was formed of alternate
strips of mica and vellum, sometimes daintily
painted, Others were formed of paper, the surface
cut in geometric patterns of circles and lozenges
with bits of mica inserted at intervals, giving
unusual richness to the fan. The sticks were
usually of ivory. The popularity of mica,
introduced about the middle of the sixteenth
century, grew to such an extent that all the leaves
of fans frequently cam to be made of this material.
These various styles of the early folded fan
represent the type which reached its ultimate
perfection in the seventeenth and eighteenth
centuries.
Commenting
on the new folding fans, Henri Estienne, who write
in the late sixteenth century, describes it in the
hands of King Henry III, "In his right hand was
placed an instrument which extended and folded
again with the touch of a finger. We call it here a
fan." According to Pierre de l’Etoile,
Henry’s fan could be unfurled with a swift
motion of the hand and was large enough to shield
his delicate complexion from the sun. And now
handsome folding fans vied with beautiful feathered
fans. The fan was, indeed, the indispensable
accessory of every toilet. "So much are they used
now," says Henri Estienne, "that once used, they
cannot abandon them; but they use them in summer to
make air and keep away the heat of the sun, and in
winter to keep away the heat of the fire."
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Under Henry IV
(1589-1610), the fashion for fans was sufficiently general
to give rise to a manufacture of considerable extent. The
right to manufacture was first authorized in December 1564
by an act which established a company made up of tradesmen
who made the fans, and master gilders, who decorated them.
The gilders were authorized "to garnish fans made from
sheepskin, silk, goatskin, enriched and ornamented, as may
please the merchant and the lord who may order them." A
later decree, passed about 1660, deprived them of this right
and gave the tradesmen "the right of having painted and
gilded fans done by any painters and gilders and of having
them mounted as might please them."
Through the
earliest record of a fan in England is said to date about
1307, the general acceptance of this fashionable accessory
was almost contemporary with its use in France. The fan was
brought into England from Italy during the Renaissance
period. Throughout the reigns of Henry VIII, Mary,
Elizabeth, and James, the fan maintained its place in
fashion. As in France, the most popular fans were the large
screen fans of ostrich feathers with carved ivory, gold and
silver handles. Queen Elizabeth found particular delight in
fans, as she did in gloves, ruffs, and kerchiefs. She is
said to have remarked at one time that a fan was the only
gift a sovereign should receive from her subjects. She is,
consequently, said to have been presented with innumerable
fans. Leicester’s New Year’s gift in 1574 is
recorded thus:
A fan of white
feathers set in a handle of gold garnished on one side with
two very fair emeralds, and fully garnished with diamonds
and rubies; the other side garnished with rubies and
diamonds. . . .
The famous
portrait of the Queen by Zuccario pictures the royal lady
carrying a handsome fan of the period. Plate XLV. Other
historic paintings show that the beautiful fan of feathers
continued to hold first place for years to come.
Excerpt
from
COSTUME AND
FASHION : VOLUME THREE : THE TUDORS : BOOK II :
1547-1603
By Herbert
Norris: E.P. Dutton and Co. Inc.
Page 50. The
Fan (continued from p. 224)
The Italian
banner-shaped fan continued in general use during the
remainder of the sixteenth century, but chiefly among the
women of Italy and especially the ladies of Venice. They
were sarcastically termed "fly whisk" by Westerners.
A beautiful
Italian feather fan is shown in Fig. 586, composed of five
straight and uncurled ostrich feathers rising from a group
of curled tips, with a rigid handle of ivory and gold. Such
a fan formed the model of those used by the great ladies of
Europe during the second half of the sixteenth century, and
in England throughout Queen Elizabeth's reign.
Page 506 THE
REIGN OF QUEEN ELIZABETH
On the Queen's
accession, she artlessly let it be known
that the most
acceptable gift that she could receive from her subjects was
a fan--although she did not decline
presents of
other kinds, The City Fathers did not need a second hint: on
every New Year's Day they brought their Royal mistress, with
becoming humility, a rich and beautiful fan. In such gifts
they wisely did not stint themselves,
In many
portraits of the Queen she is seen holding a feather fan in
her hand,
attached by a
narrow ferret or riband to the girdle at her waist. Her
wardrobe contained many such fans, and a few are described
below. A fan belonging
to the Queen in
1577 was of' ‘flowers of sylke of sundry colours, the
handill of an inbrawdry worke set with small sede perle.' A
fan presented to Her Majesty for a ‘Newyers-tyde' gift
had the handle studded with diamonds, 'A fanne of white
feathers, with a handle of gold, having two snakes wyndinge
about it, garnished with a ball of diamonds at the ende, and
a crowne on
each side
within a paire of wings garnished .with diamonds' was
in
the
Queen's
possession in
I600. This description
has inspired
Fig. 587· 'One fanne of feathers of divers colours, the
handle of golde, with a base
Page 507
and a ragged
staffe
on both sides
[obviously a gift from some member of the Dudley family] and
a looking glasse on throne side' proves that, contrary to
report, Elizabeth actually carried
a mirror.
Another
example had
'one
handle of golde
enameled, set with small rubies and emerodes, with a Shipp
under
saile on throne
side.' In the inventory of her wardrobe made in I603~ no
fewer than thirty-one beautiful fans
of great worth
are enumerated. Some of these were of feathers and
others of the new folding type. As much as , 40
was sometimes given for a fan in Elizabeth's time.
(Continued on
p, 628)
Page 628 THE
REIGN OF QUEEN ELIZABETH
THE FAN
(continued from
.p. 507)
The feather
fan, as described in Section I, held its own in spite of the
rivalry of a new type, It was greatly appreciated for its.
graceful line,
and for the
seductive flow of its plumes; besides,
no one could
possible deny
its picturesque
advantages, In
France, the
feather fan was pre-eminent, its use being stimulated by
that leader of fashion, Marguerite de Valois, who had an
extraordinary passion for magnificent fans, These cost a
very great deal of money, which naturally aroused her
husband's justifiable displeasure, Towards the end of the
century the feather fan had become an almost indispensible
item of the wardrobe of all ladies and gentlewomen, and even
of the wives of the minor merchants, Some lines dated I598
show for what other purposes the feather fan might be
used:
Were fannes and
Aappes of feathers fond
To flit away
the Aisking Aies ...
But seeing they
are still in hand,
In
house, in
field, in church, in street
In
summer,
winter, water,
land,
In colde, in
heate, in dry, in weet,
I judge they
are for wives such tooles
As babies are
in playes for fooles,
Some of these
fans had very long handles and were found very useful as
husband beaters.
XVIc. 1560
Italian, Venetian, (Vienna, Art History Museum.)
The fan is of a
specifically Italian form, derived from Moslem lands, seen
in particularly in Venice: rigid and fixed to a stick. Used
by all classes, it ranged from stark simplicity to elaborate
decorativeness, but in either case was fringed and
tasseled.
Coryat was much
struck by the Italian fans: "Most of them are very elegant
and pretty things. For whereas the frame consisteth of a
painted piece of paper and a little wooden handle; the paper
which is fastened into the top is on both sides most
curiously adorned with excellent pictures, either of amorous
things tending to dalliance, having some witty Italian verse
or fine emblemes written under them; or of some notable
Italian city with a brief description thereof added
thereunto. These fannes are of a meane price. For a man may
buy one of the fairest of them for so much money as
countervaileth with our English groat."
The rigid
flay-fan seems to have been in intermittent use in Europe
from the early centuries AD. They were made either of
plaited straw of various colors, of linen painted and
embroidered, of parchment or vellum, or of silk, woven and
embroidered, often with a lozenge-shaped diapering. The
earliest examples, which survive would appear to have Coptic
or Saracenic origins. Two from the cemetery of Akhmin, the
Greek Panopolis, are thought to belong to the period of the
4th to
the 6th
century AD. One of these is a finely plaited brown, red and
black straw with a representation of four hearts encircling
a cross, and the other is of a reticulated diapered pattern
with a border of linen.
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