Silk (noun, often attributive): 1: a fine continuous protein fiber produced by various insect larvae usually for cocoons, especially: a lustrous tough elastic fiber produced by silkworms and used for textiles; 2: thread, yarn, or fabric made from silk filaments; 3a: a garment of silk; b(1): a distinctive silk gown worn by a King's or Queen's Counsel; (2): a King's or Queen's Counsel; c. silks, plural: the colored cap and blouse of a jockey or harness horse driver made in the registered racing color of the employing stable; 4a: a filament resembling silk, especially: one produced by a spider; b: silky material, milkweed silk, especially: the styles of an ear of corn; 5: PARACHUTE
Shakespeare’s Globe tells us that silk, like velvet, was an immediate indicator of high social class. Sandra Clark tells us that in Shakespeare’s time, buttons were “originally ornamental in use rather than functional, made of gold, silk, gold and silver thread, and other precious materials.” Liza Picard tells us that “Only earls could wear cloth of gold, or purple silk.” Silk was expensive; Material and Fabrics in Elizabethan England relays that “Knights returning from the Crusades returned with silks and cottons from the Middle East.” Silk was a treasured fabric, and its production has a rich history.
In “History of Silk Production,” author David Landy tell us that the English began making silk in the 13th century, but faced barriers because of their cool climate. He writes that silk was introduced to America in 1603, “when silkworm eggs and mulberry seeds were sent to Virginia by order of King James.” The English “wanted to rival the French and Italians in silk production, by having the American colonists raise silk for them…silk was produced erratically in Virginia and Georgia until about the 1760’s.”
The English hoped to rival the French and Italians in silk production, by having the American colonists raise silk for them. Silk was produced erratically in Virginia and Georgia until about the 1760’s. By this time, cotton and tobacco had proven to be more lucrative products for the southern colonies.
The Elizabethan People by Henry Thew Stephenson reveals that masks, which were predominately worn by women, “were made of silk, as a rule, and were either pinned or tied.” Stephenson continues, “Stockings, or nether hose, were usually of silk and gartered at the top below the knee. They were worn of all colours, and were padded only when necessary to improve the shape of the leg.” When fans became popular, they were attached to the girdle by a silk cord.
In “Renaissance Fashion: Women's Clothing in Elizabethan England,” Dolores Monet tells writes: “The luxurious fashions depicted in Elizabethan artwork most often reflect the clothing worn by royalty, the nobility, and the elite. The upper classes wore garments made of silk, satin, velvet, damask, and taffeta, in addition to wool and linen.” Many of these terms are also mentioned in the Dictionary, and it’s important to note that since much of the artwork at this time was created for nobility, silk is often depicted in Elizabethan artwork. Monet also tells us that women’s dress shoes were often made of silk and velvet, and then embellished with embroidery and block print.
In "'‘Rich like a Lady’: Cross-Class Dressing in the Brothels and Theaters of Early Modern London,” Cristine M. Varholy writes that in Elizabethan times, it was forbidden to dress above your station—except in theatre. Varholy tells us that while plenty of research has been conducted on cross-dressing during this time, not much has been written about dressing across classes. She writes, “The use of opulent clothing to portray oneself as belonging to a higher class was, of course, exactly the behavior early modern sumptuary regulations legislated against. While the fundamental assumption of such regulations was that clothing could and should accurately present the status of its wearers and thereby preserve social order, the very need for such legislation revealed that clothing as a sign was unreliable.” The sumptuary laws targeted people who tried to dress above their station, but it was largely unsuccessful—Varholy tells us, “Despite the legislation, in actual practice, clothing often circulated across class lines.”
Cross-class dressing often occurred in illegal contexts. Varholy notes that most early modern women did not have enough money to buy their own clothing: “Instead, they generally received clothing from their fathers, husbands, or masters, men who existed in positions of authority over them, or from suitors, who sought to attain such a position of authority.” As receivers of gifts, women became somewhat indebted to men, and the gifts that men gave reflected their views. Varholy argues that this gift-giving was gendered, writing that “gifts of clothing were constitutive, and the gift-giving process tended to be strictly gendered: the gifts enabled the male giver to reconstruct both his partner and himself. For example, a gift of particularly opulent clothing enabled the giver not only to imagine his partner to be a lady, but also, to imagine himself a gentlemen.” So we know to watch out for gift-giving in Shakspeare’s texts, and to consider what the gift itself says about the giver.
“SILK” APPEARS IN THE FOLLOWING TEXTS:
KING LEAR
Let not the creaking of shoes nor the rustling of silks betray
thy poor heart to woman. Keep thy foot out of brothel, thy hand
out of placket, thy pen from lender's book, and defy the foul
fiend. Still through the hawthorn blows the cold wind; says
suum, mun, hey, no, nonny. Dolphin my boy, my boy, sessa! let
him trot by.
KING LEAR
Why, thou wert better in thy grave than to answer with thy
uncover'd body this extremity of the skies. Is man no more than
this? Consider him well. Thou ow'st the worm no silk, the beast
no hide, the sheep no wool, the cat no perfume. Ha! Here's three
on's are sophisticated!
LOVE’S LABOURS LOST
Why, then, three-farthing worth of silk.
LOVER’S COMPLAINT
Oft did she heave her napkin to her eyne,
Which on it had conceited characters,
Laundering the silken figures in the brine
That season'd woe had pelleted in tears,
And often reading what contents it bears;
As often shrieking undistinguish'd woe,
In clamours of all size, both high and low.
LOVER’S COMPLAINT
Of folded schedules had she many a one,
Which she perused, sigh'd, tore, and gave the flood;
Crack'd many a ring of posied gold and bone
Bidding them find their sepulchres in mud;
Found yet moe letters sadly penn'd in blood,
With sleided silk feat and affectedly
Enswathed, and seal'd to curious secrecy.
LOVER’S COMPLAINT
'His browny locks did hang in crooked curls;
And every light occasion of the wind
Upon his lips their silken parcels hurls.
What's sweet to do, to do will aptly find:
Each eye that saw him did enchant the mind,
For on his visage was in little drawn
What largeness thinks in Paradise was sawn.
MERCHANT OF VENICE
Should I go to church
And see the holy edifice of stone,
And not bethink me straight of dangerous rocks,
Which touching but my gentle vessel's side,
Would scatter all her spices on the stream,
Enrobe the roaring waters with my silks,
And, in a word, but even now worth this,
And now worth nothing?
MERRY WIVES OF WINDSOR
…I warrant you, in silk and gold; and in
such alligant terms; and in such wine and sugar of
the best and the fairest, that would have won any
woman's heart; and, I warrant you, they could never
get an eye-wink of her: I had myself twenty angels
given me this morning; but I defy all angels, in
any such sort, as they say, but in the way of
honesty: and, I warrant you, they could never get
her so much as sip on a cup with the proudest of
them all: and yet there has been earls, nay, which
is more, pensioners; but, I warrant you, all is one with her.
MERRY WIVES OF WINDSOR
That silk will I go buy.
MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM
O Sisters Three,
Come, come to me,
With hands as pale as milk;
Lay them in gore,
Since you have shore
With shears his thread of silk.
MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING
But there is no such man: for, brother, men
Can counsel and speak comfort to that grief
Which they themselves not feel; but, tasting it,
Their counsel turns to passion, which before
Would give preceptial medicine to rage,
Fetter strong madness in a silken thread,
Charm ache with air and agony with words:
No, no; 'tis all men's office to speak patience
To those that wring under the load of sorrow,
But no man's virtue nor sufficiency
To be so moral when he shall endure
The like himself.
OTHELLO
'Tis true: there's magic in the web of it:
A sibyl, that had number'd in the world
The sun to course two hundred compasses,
In her prophetic fury sew'd the work;
The worms were hallow'd that did breed the silk;
And it was dyed in mummy which the skilful
Conserved of maidens' hearts.
PERICLES
And I can speak of the disturbances
That nature works, and of her cures; which doth give me
A more content in course of true delight
Than to be thirsty after tottering honour,
Or tie my treasure up in silken bags,
To please the fool and death.
PERICLES
Be't when she weaved the sleided silk
With fingers long, small, white as milk;
Or when she would with sharp needle wound
The cambric, which she made more sound
By hurting it; or when to the lute
She sung, and made the night-bird mute,
That still records with moan; or when
She would with rich and constant pen
Vail to her mistress Dian; still
This Philoten contends in skill
With absolute Marina: so
With the dove of Paphos might the crow
Vie feathers white.
PERICLES
Marina thus the brothel 'scapes, and chances
Into an honest house, our story says.
She sings like one immortal, and she dances
As goddess-like to her admired lays;
Deep clerks she dumbs; and with her needle composes
Nature's own shape, of bud, bird, branch, or berry,
That even her art sisters the natural roses;
Her inkle, silk, twin with the rubied cherry:
That pupils lacks she none of noble race,
Who pour their bounty on her; and her gain
She gives the cursed bawd.
TAMING OF THE SHREW
Much good do it unto thy gentle heart!
Kate, eat apace. And now, my honey love,
Will we return unto thy father's house
And revel it as bravely as the best,
With silken coats and caps, and golden rings,
With ruffs and cuffs and farthingales and things,
With scarfs and fans and double change of brav'ry.
With amber bracelets, beads, and all this knav'ry.
What, hast thou din'd? The tailor stays thy leisure,
To deck thy body with his ruffling treasure.
TAMING OF THE SHREW
Why, thou say'st true; it is a paltry cap,
A custard-coffin, a bauble, a silken pie;
I love thee well in that thou lik'st it not.
TAMING OF THE SHREW
What am I, sir? Nay, what are you, sir? O immortal gods!
O fine villain! A silken doublet, a velvet hose, a scarlet cloak,
and a copatain hat! O, I am undone! I am undone! While I play the
good husband at home, my son and my servant spend all at the
university.
TROLIUS AND CRESSIDA
We turn not back the silks upon the merchant,
When we have soil'd them, nor the remainder viands
We do not throw in unrespective sieve,
Because we now are full.
TROLIUS AND CRESSIDA
No! why art thou then exasperate, thou idle
immaterial skein of sleave-silk, thou green sarcenet
flap for a sore eye, thou tassel of a prodigal's
purse, thou? Ah, how the poor world is pestered
with such waterflies, diminutives of nature!
WINTER’S TALE
Will you buy any tape,
Or lace for your cape,
My dainty duck, my dear-a?
Any silk, any thread,
Any toys for your head,
Of the new'st and finest, finest wear-a?
Come to the pedlar;
Money's a medler.
That doth utter all men's ware-a.
ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA
Her gentlewomen, like the Nereides,
So many mermaids, tended her i' the eyes,
And made their bends adornings: at the helm
A seeming mermaid steers: the silken tackle
Swell with the touches of those flower-soft hands,
That yarely frame the office. From the barge
A strange invisible perfume hits the sense
Of the adjacent wharfs. The city cast
Her people out upon her; and Antony,
Enthroned i' the market-place, did sit alone,
Whistling to the air; which, but for vacancy,
Had gone to gaze on Cleopatra too,
And made a gap in nature.
AS YOU LIKE IT
No faith, proud mistress, hope not after it;
'Tis not your inky brows, your black silk hair,
Your bugle eyeballs, nor your cheek of cream,
That can entame my spirits to your worship.
You foolish shepherd, wherefore do you follow her,
Like foggy south, puffing with wind and rain?
You are a thousand times a properer man
Than she a woman.
COMEDY OF ERRORS
There's not a man I meet but doth salute me
As if I were their well-acquainted friend;
And every one doth call me by my name.
Some tender money to me; some invite me;
Some other give me thanks for kindnesses;
Some offer me commodities to buy:
Even now a tailor call'd me in his shop
And show'd me silks that he had bought for me,
And therewithal took measure of my body.
Sure, these are but imaginary wiles
And Lapland sorcerers inhabit here.
CORIOLANUS
May these same instruments, which you profane,
Never sound more! when drums and trumpets shall
I' the field prove flatterers, let courts and cities be
Made all of false-faced soothing!
When steel grows soft as the parasite's silk,
Let him be made a coverture for the wars!
CORIOLANUS
You lords and heads o' the state, perfidiously
He has betray'd your business, and given up,
For certain drops of salt, your city Rome,
I say 'your city,' to his wife and mother;
Breaking his oath and resolution like
A twist of rotten silk, never admitting
Counsel o' the war, but at his nurse's tears
He whined and roar'd away your victory,
That pages blush'd at him and men of heart
Look'd wondering each at other.
CYMBELINE
First, her bedchamber,—
Where, I confess, I slept not, but profess
Had that was well worth watching—it was hang'd
With tapesty of silk and silver; the story
Proud Cleopatra, when she met her Roman,
And Cydnus swell'd above the banks, or for
The press of boats or pride: a piece of work
So bravely done, so rich, that it did strive
In workmanship and value; which I wonder'd
Could be so rarely and exactly wrought,
Since the true life on't was—
CYMBELINE
O, this life
Is nobler than attending for a cheque,
Richer than doing nothing for a bauble,
Prouder than rustling in unpaid-for silk:
Such gain the cap of him that makes 'em fine,
Yet keeps his book uncross'd: no life to ours.
HENRY IV, PART II
My lord, I'll tell you what:
If my young lord your son have not the day,
Upon mine honour, for a silken point
I'll give my barony. Never talk of it.
HENRY IV, PART II
I have him for it; and the young lion repents—marry, not in ashes
sackcloth, but in new silk and old sack.
HENRY IV, PART II
I am undone by his going; I warrant you, he's an
infinitive thing upon my score. Good Master Fang, hold him
Good Master Snare, let him not scape. 'A comes continuantly
Pie-corner—saving your manhoods—to buy a saddle; and he is
indited to dinner to the Lubber's Head in Lumbert Street, to
Master Smooth's the silkman.
HENRY V
Now all the youth of England are on fire,
And silken dalliance in the wardrobe lies:
Now thrive the armourers, and honour's thought
Reigns solely in the breast of every man:
They sell the pasture now to buy the horse,
Following the mirror of all Christian kings,
With winged heels, as English Mercuries.
HENRY V
Thus with imagined wing our swift scene flies
In motion of no less celerity
Than that of thought. Suppose that you have seen
The well-appointed king at Hampton pier
Embark his royalty; and his brave fleet
With silken streamers the young Phoebus fanning…
HENRY VI, PART II
As for these silken-coated slaves, I pass not:
It is to you, good people, that I speak,
Over whom, in time to come, I hope to reign;
For I am rightful heir unto the crown.
KING JOHN
O inglorious league!
Shall we, upon the footing of our land,
Send fair-play orders and make compromise,
Insinuation, parley and base truce
To arms invasive? shall a beardless boy,
A cocker'd silken wanton, brave our fields,
And flesh his spirit in a warlike soil,
Mocking the air with colours idly spread,
And find no cheque? Let us, my liege, to arms:
Perchance the cardinal cannot make your peace;
Or if he do, let it at least be said
They saw we had a purpose of defence.
RICHARD III
Cannot a plain man live and think no harm,
But thus his simple truth must be abused
By silken, sly, insinuating Jacks?
ROMEO AND JULIET
'Tis almost morning; I would have thee gone:
And yet no further than a wanton's bird;
Who lets it hop a little from her hand,
Like a poor prisoner in his twisted gyves,
And with a silk thread plucks it back again,
So loving-jealous of his liberty.
ROMEO AND JULIET
More than prince of cats, I can tell you. O, he is
the courageous captain of compliments. He fights as
you sing prick-song, keeps time, distance, and
proportion; rests me his minim rest, one, two, and
the third in your bosom: the very butcher of a silk
button, a duellist, a duellist; a gentleman of the
very first house, of the first and second cause:
ah, the immortal passado! the punto reverso! the
hai!
TIMON OF ATHENS
Thy flatterers yet wear silk, drink wine, lie soft;
Hug their diseased perfumes, and have forgot
That ever Timon was. Shame not these woods,
By putting on the cunning of a carper.
TITUS ANDRONICUS
O, had the monster seen those lily hands
Tremble, like aspen-leaves, upon a lute,
And make the silken strings delight to kiss them,
He would not then have touch'd them for his life!
Or, had he heard the heavenly harmony
Which that sweet tongue hath made,
He would have dropp'd his knife, and fell asleep
As Cerberus at the Thracian poet's feet.
TWO GENTLEMEN OF VERONA
No, girl, I'll knit it up in silken strings
With twenty odd-conceited true-love knots.
To be fantastic may become a youth
Of greater time than I shall show to be.
WINTER’S TALE
Your heart is full of something that does take
Your mind from feasting. Sooth, when I was young
And handed love as you do, I was wont
To load my she with knacks: I would have ransack'd
The pedlar's silken treasury and have pour'd it
To her acceptance; you have let him go
And nothing marted with him. If your lass
Interpretation should abuse and call this
Your lack of love or bounty, you were straited
For a reply, at least if you make a care
Of happy holding her.