Saturday, August 30, 2014

Overview of the Folk Costumes of Europe

Hello all, 
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

 

Faldbuningar

  
Faroe Islands




Ireland




Scotland





 
England



 
 Wales




Brittany

Bigoudin


Kemper [Quimper]
 

Plougastel



France

Berry
 

 Normandie [Normandy]


Provence



Euskadi [the Basque Country]



 Andorra [also Rousillon and Catalonia]


 

Spain

Andalucia 


 La Mancha


Galicia


 
Portugal

Minho 


 Madeira


 Algarve

 

Monaco [also Nice]





Italy

 Lombardy



Lazio 


 Calabria



Arbëreshë [Italo Albanians]





Vatican City

There is no women's costume for the Vatican




Sardinia

Florinas


Orgosolo


Quartu Sant'Elena


 

Malta



 
 Switzerland

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



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





Gniljane



Crna Gora [Montenegro]




Macedonia

Skopska Blatija



 Galichnik



 Radovish



Gorani
 
 

 

 
 Albania

North Albania and Kosovo [Gheg]


Sulovë, Central Albania



Fieri, South Albania [Tosk]



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

Svetlahorski region, Western Polissia

  
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

33 comments:

  1. So, so much !!!

    I'm so glad I found your blog a few months ago, it is so full of beauty ! How dull are our clothes nowadays...

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    1. I totally agree.
      why are we so willing to wear drab clothing?

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  2. Wow! It so wonderful collection of folk suites!

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  3. Thank you for your generosity in sharing your research, from Elaine in Australia

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  4. Actually, 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.

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    1. Thank 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?
      I 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.

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  5. How do you do? I am Japanese woman who is interested in traditional costume. Especially I was used to familiar with Transylvania about 20
    years 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.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. That would be fine. Feel free to put links to my blog as well.

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    2. Thank you very much.

      By 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.

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  6. Amazing collection! simply Wonderful! Thank you for preparing and publishing it! Looking forward to its further development!!!

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  7. Nice post,, i'm very enjoyed to visit this site :D

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  8. hi! great collection....but....is EUSKADI...thankx!

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  9. Very informative post. Great reference as to distinguish the costumes on the basic level. Thank you!

    Only 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!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you for your input. I am glad that you enjoyed my articles.
      I 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.

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    2. 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.

      As 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.

      Delete
  10. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  11. Hi, 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..

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  12. I 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.

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  13. I don't see anything from Georgia - it seems to be the one country that is missing!

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    Replies
    1. While 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.

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  14. Roman. 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?

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  15. Hello Roman
    Great! 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

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    Replies
    1. Thank you fr the correction. I should have noticed that

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  16. Wonderful 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.

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  17. Thank you for all these beautiful pictures of costumes - very nice!
    Robin

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  18. Your 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!

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  19. Europe costumes is nice. Glad to have read your article.

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  20. Super blog a krásne kroje.Mne sa páči najviac Guroľský kroj z obce Ždiar,Slovakia😀👍

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  21. Hi! 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!

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  22. Hi! 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!

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    Replies
    1. Here's a source for a read: https://www.zeeuwseankers.nl/verhaal/verschillende-streekdrachten

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