this is my 200th article, and I thought i should do something rather different.
I will do an overview of the folk costumes of Europe. I will follow nation-states, as inappropriate as that may be, but i will also cover nations without states. Some very small and obscure ethnic groups will be omitted for lack of available material. I will also not be covering the north Caucuses, as there is simply too much material there.
Where there is a recognized or unofficial 'National Costume' I will show that. This will necessarily not include much in the way of explanation.
Iceland
Upphultur
Peysufot
Faroe Islands
Ireland
Scotland
England
Brittany
Bigoudin
Kemper [Quimper]
Plougastel
France
Berry
Normandie [Normandy]
Provence
Euskadi [the Basque Country]
Andorra [also Rousillon and Catalonia]
Spain
Andalucia
La Mancha
Galicia
Minho
Madeira
Algarve
Monaco [also Nice]
Italy
Lazio
Calabria
There is no women's costume for the Vatican
Sardinia
Florinas
Orgosolo
Quartu Sant'Elena
Malta
Appenzell
Valais/Wallis
Graubunden/Grisons
Liechtenstein
Germany
Miesbach, Bavaria
Gutach, Schwartzwald
Scheesel, Lower Saxony
Luxembourg
Belgium
The Netherlands
Volendam
Beveland
Staphorst
Friesland [Frisia]
West
East
North
Denmark
Fanø
Hedebo
Amager
Norway
There have been several attempts to design a national costume, but most of them have not received much acceptance. The most successful was a simplified form of the Hardanger costume, but this is currently little used, as most people wear their local bunad.
Hardanger
Setesdal
Gudbrandsdal
Sweden
National Costume
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Värend
Rättvik
Sabme [Lappland]
Jokkmokk
Kautokeino
Skolt
Finland
Häme, western Finland
Kaukola, Finnish Karelia
Tuuteri, on the Finnish Isthmus
Estonia
Järva-Jaani, North Estonia
Muhu Island
Setu, South Estonia
Livonia
Latvia
Latgale
Vidzeme
Nica
Lithuania
Aukštaitija
Žemaitija
Vilnius
Kaszëbskô [Kashubia]
Poland
Łowicz, Mazowsze
Krakow, Małopolska
Podhale
One of many Górale or Highlander costumes
Sorbia [Lusatia]
Chosebus [Cottbus], Lower Lusatia
Slepo [Schleife], Upper Lusatia
Catholic costume, Upper Lusatia
Bohemia
Plzeň [Pilsen]
Blata
Nové Paky, Northeast Bohemia
Moravia
Hanak
Valašsko
Vlčnov, Slovacko
Slovakia
Myjava
Detva
Šariš
Hungary
Palóc
Kalocsa
Matyó
Austria
Montafon, Vorarlberg
Tyrol
Upper Austria
Slovenia
Gorenjsko
Dolenjska
Bela Krajina
Croatia
Posavina
Zagrebačko Prigorje
Dubrovnik/Konavle
Bosnia
Moslem town costume
East Hercegovina Orthodox Serbian Costume
Travnik, Catholic Croatian Costume
Serbia
Šumadija
Vojvodina
Crna Gora [Montenegro]
Macedonia
Skopska Blatija
Gorani
Albania
North Albania and Kosovo [Gheg]
Sulovë, Central Albania
Greece
Amalia Costume, Athens
Kriti [Crete]
Karagouna, Thessaly
Cyprus
Bulgaria
Sofia [Shope]
Rhodope
Severnjashko [North]
Vlach
in Serbia
in Greece
in Albania
Romania
Wallachia
Transylvania
Moldavia
Moldova
Gagauz
Crimean Tatar
Ukraine
Central Ukraine
Hutsul
Volyn'
Carpatho-Rusyn, Lemko
Komancha
Venhryny [Čirč region]
Jakubany
Belarus
Malarytski region, Eastern Polissia
Russia
Peasants from northern Russia
Kaluga Province
Voronezh Province
Karelia [Russian held part]
Tver' Province Karelians
Veps
Nenets
The Nentsi [formerly known as the Samoyed], live along the arctic coast from the White Sea to well past the Urals, and thus into Asia.
Komi
Permliak
Udmurtia
Northern Udmurt
Southern Udmurt
Mari-El
Ural Mari
Mordovia
Erzya
Moksha, Contemporary Costume
Men
Chuvashia
Anatri Chuvash bride and her father
Anat Enchi bride, groom and married woman
Virial Chuvash Matchmaker
Tatarstan [Kazan']
Bashkortostan [Bashkir]
Kalmuk [Kalmyk]
Thank you for reading, I hope that you have found this to be interesting and informative.
Roman Kozak
So, so much !!!
ReplyDeleteI'm so glad I found your blog a few months ago, it is so full of beauty ! How dull are our clothes nowadays...
I totally agree.
Deletewhy are we so willing to wear drab clothing?
Wow! It so wonderful collection of folk suites!
ReplyDeleteThank you for your generosity in sharing your research, from Elaine in Australia
ReplyDeleteActually, the first "Nenets" picture contains Khanty people, not Nenets. And it is taken in village Russkinskaya, Khanty-Mansi autonomous okrug, Western Siberia. So it's not in Europe. The rest of photos might contain Nenets (I am sure that people in 3rd "Nenets" photo are Nenets people), but the people there wear clothes of Yamal peninsula Tundra Nenetses most likely.
ReplyDeleteThank you for that information. I am having trouble obtaining reliable information on the Nenets. Do you know of any good publications or sources of material for the clothing of the Nentsi?
DeleteI am well aware that the internet is full of misattributed photos, especially Pinterest. I will seek to obtain other photos that would be more reliable.
How do you do? I am Japanese woman who is interested in traditional costume. Especially I was used to familiar with Transylvania about 20
ReplyDeleteyears ago.
I often write about Transylvania in my weblog and do irasos (Kalotaszegi embroidery) a little.
I would like to link some entries and photos of your weblog to my weblog. Is it OK?
I hope my poor English is to be understood.
That would be fine. Feel free to put links to my blog as well.
DeleteThank you very much.
DeleteBy the way, have you ever heard about Native Japanese "AINU"?
I think Ainu's traditional costume is similar to Siberian people. Generally, Japanese culture have influence from China, but AINU people have different style and their embroidery named Chijiri is also beautiful.
Amazing collection! simply Wonderful! Thank you for preparing and publishing it! Looking forward to its further development!!!
ReplyDeleteNice post,, i'm very enjoyed to visit this site :D
ReplyDeletehi! great collection....but....is EUSKADI...thankx!
ReplyDeleteVery informative post. Great reference as to distinguish the costumes on the basic level. Thank you!
ReplyDeleteOnly wanted to clear few things for you regarding the naming from my home country - Poland. Just for educational purposes :)
You put there the three most well-known costumes and described the first two by the regions of origin - Mazowsze and Małopolska. The name of the third though (you put there "Zakopane Góral") is the costume of the Podhale region (which theoretically speaking is located in southern Małopolska). Zakopane is the most southern city/town in Podhale, surrounded by the highest parts of the Tatra Mountains, and due to the rocky geology the costume from the city itself is often named "Skalne Podhale" (could be translated to: rocky Podhale).
There's BTW a problem with the word Góral being used wrongly in the English language in general, because in the Polish language it just means a "Mountaineer"/"Highlander" and is used to describe various other (!) groups from all over the world. The group from Podhale is simply the largest of the Polish highlanders and had created a lot of quite visible expatriate communities, especially in the USA, therefore the Podhale costume is often wrongly associated with the word "Góral" (while it is still terribly wrong, because the word "Góral" itself means only a male mountaneer - a woman is "Góralka" - and it should be e.g. an adjective: "Góralskie" or the plural form "Górale").
I also don't know where did you get the spelling "Kaszubia" from? Kashubia in the Polish language is "Kaszuby" and in the Kashubian language: "Kaszëbë" or "Kaszëbskô".
In case you'd be interested, I run a tumblr blog where I collect pictures of various costumes from the territory of Poland, could leave you a link. I already collected there examples of around 10 various "Górale" costumes, each having own distinctive embroidery patterns.
Warm greetings from Poland!
Thank you for your input. I am glad that you enjoyed my articles.
DeleteI used those three costumes because they are the most commonly used to portray Poland. I shall correct the errors which you pointed out. I am sure that you realise that the term Goral is often mistakenly used just to refer to the people from Podhale. I tried to indicate that it was a more general term by the way in which I phrased it. It seems that it could be improved. I am well aware that there are many other Gorale groups which each have a distinct costume. I thank you for making more information available to my readers. I would be very interested in seeing the information on your blog, and I am sure that my readers would as well. Please feel free to share that link.. Thank you once again.
Thank YOU for running that blog. I stumbled across it a while ago, looking some embroidery patterns (I don't even remember what exactly that was) and immediately added you to my bookmarks. So many great references and resources.
DeleteAs it comes to the Polish costumes you posted above, I'm well aware that they are the most "commonly used" as you wrote. And nothing was wrong with them, I just decided to provide you more informations, because you're a great source of informations and seem to be very particular as it comes to the facts. Just like I wrote in the first comment, I also know how popular the term "Góral" had become outside Poland, but all I can do is to inform the people one by one about its real meaning and about the existence a region called Podhale.
My gallery of Polish costumes is to be found under the link: http://polishcostumes.tumblr.com/ - check the "list of regions" link in the sidebar to find the various Górale groups. I'm also trying to create short articles about the costumes here in my blogspot (so far I had time to arrange posts about only two regions: Kraków and Lachy Sądeckie group, but more will surely come with time) http://lelapolela.blogspot.com/search/label/Polish%20folk%20costumes
Thank you and keep doing the great job, your blog is very inspiring.
just blogwalking.. nice post :D
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ReplyDeleteHi, I would like to ask if you have a clearer view of the boy's clothing from the country of Monaco.. My son is a candidate for Mr. United Nation in his school and I need to see the exact picture.. I hope you could help me.. Thank you.. And also the picture's are wonderful..
ReplyDeleteI like the way you go from West to East so it shows stylistic transitions in logical fashion. I live in UK and am sad that England has no genuine "national costume" although logically it should look something like the nordic and something like the Normandy folk style. Perhaps the dress of country people just before the English civil war might have been the nearest England ever had for a folk costume.
ReplyDeleteI don't see anything from Georgia - it seems to be the one country that is missing!
ReplyDeleteWhile Georgia may be considered European by culture, it is technically in Asia, as it lies on the south side of the Caucuses. I did mention that I did not include the Caucuses in this article, I did a separate overview of the Caucuses peoples. Thank you for reading.
DeleteRoman. Always a pleasure to see your work. I never see anything about the clothing of the Jews of Ukraine and Russia. Have you any info?
ReplyDeleteHello Roman
ReplyDeleteGreat! I like your blog very much. And I am very pleased you didn't forget my country. But please write Liechtenstein correctly. It's not Lichtenstein - but Liechtenstein :-)
Best regards
Thank you fr the correction. I should have noticed that
DeleteHi Roman, appreciate I'm asking this 10 years after you've posted this, but there's been a bit of spam recently on this post, any chance you could remove it/up the spam filter? I know people only comment about once year, but I'm always interested to read those :)
DeleteWonderful website. My 3rd grade great nephew is presenting a talk about Belgium and wants to dress in the manner of traditional folk clothing. This was a great resource, plus I loved seeing all the other countries' clothing.
ReplyDeleteThank you for all these beautiful pictures of costumes - very nice!
ReplyDeleteRobin
Fantastic blog. Thanks a lot!
ReplyDeleteYour creative works are really appreciable. I really admire your writing about these costumes and love for reading your article. A great job, you have done. I'm really found off to wear costumes at festivals. Thanks for Sharing with us. Cheers!
ReplyDeleteEurope costumes is nice. Glad to have read your article.
ReplyDeleteSuper blog a krásne kroje.Mne sa páči najviac Guroľský kroj z obce Ždiar,Slovakia😀👍
ReplyDeleteHi! I really appreciate this blog- do you happen to know the specific traditional dress of Norbotten Sweden? My family settled in Byske. Thank you for sharing your passion!
ReplyDeleteHi! I realise it's been 9 years since you published this, but a small correction on the Netherlands. The costume you have down as 'Beveland' is from Zuid-Beveland (South Beveland). It is also the protestant costume. Catholic costume from the same island is very different; and the costume from Noord-Beveland (North Beveland) is different again. After all, there is a bit of sea in between the 2 islands!
ReplyDeleteHere's a source for a read: https://www.zeeuwseankers.nl/verhaal/verschillende-streekdrachten
DeleteThe Flag of Europe with its twelve gold stars on a blue background symbolizes unity,harmony, and cooperation among European nations. Its simple and elegant design represents the ideals of solidarity and integration that the European Union strives for.
ReplyDeleteSuch interesting collection of the folk costumes! Thanks for your job! I wonder Russians traditional 'Kokoshnik' , it is not presented here. Really recommend to find sarafan+kokoshnik costume, that is more popular in northwest part of Russia. It is really beautiful art.
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