Visard

{{Short description|16th century European mask for women}} {{other uses|Vizard (disambiguation)}} thumb|right|A 16th-century woman wears a visard while riding with her husband. [[File:Sic nobilis femina vel equitant, vel obambulant.jpg|thumb|right|A woman wearing a visard, as engraved by Abraham de Bruyn in 1581.]] [[File:Ca' Rezzonico - Il rinoceronte 1751 - Pietro Longhi .jpg |thumb|right|A woman wearing a ''moretta muta'' appears in this 1751 painting by Pietro Longhi.]]

A '''visard''', also known as a '''vizard''', is an oval mask of black velvet which was worn by travelling women in the early modern period to protect their skin from sunburn, as a tan suggested that the bearer worked outside and was hence poor.{{sfnp|Holme|1688}} Performers in court masques also disguised themselves with masks called visards, recorded in England as early as 1377.<ref>Skiles Howard, "Henrician Masque", Peter C. Herman, ''Rethinking the Henrician Era: Essays on Early Tudor Texts and Contexts'' (University of Illinois, 1994), p. 23.</ref> Visards were either held in place by a fastening or ribbon tie, or the wearer clasped a bead attached to the interior of the mask between their teeth.{{sfnp|Elgin|2005}}

The practice did not meet universal approval, as evidenced in this excerpt from a contemporary polemic:{{sfnp|Twycross|2002|p=300}} {{blockquote|When they use to ride abroad, they have visors made of velvet ... wherewith they cover all their faces, having holes made in them against their eyes, whereout they look so that if a man that knew not their guise before, should chance to meet one of them he would think he met a monster or a devil: for face he can see none, but two broad holes against her eyes, with glasses in them.|Phillip Stubbes|Anatomy of Abuses (1583)}}

<div class="thumbinner" style="width: 370px"> 175px|The front of a 16th-century velvet visard. 175px|Its reverse.<br /> <small>A visard recovered from inside the wall of a 16th-century building in Daventry, England.{{sfnp|Portable Antiquities Scheme|2010}}</small> </div>

In Venice, the visard developed into a design without a mouth hole, the ''moretta'', and was gripped with a button between the teeth rather than a bead. The mask's prevention of speech was deliberate, intended to heighten the mystery of a masked woman.{{sfnp|Steward|Knox|1996|p=56}}

== Notable wearers == [[File:Daniel Rabel - The Royal Ballet of the Dowager of Bilbao's Grand Ball - WGA18593.jpg|thumb|right|Dancers with visards, ''The Dowager of Bilbao's Grand Ball, 1626'', by Daniel Rabel]] A Spanish observer at the wedding of Mary I of England and Philip of Spain in 1554 mentioned that women in London wore masks, ''antifaces'', or veils when walking outside.{{sfnp|Muñoz|1877|p=77}}{{sfnp|Linthicum|1936|p=272}} Masks became more common in England in the 1570s, leading Emanuel van Meteren to write that "ladies of distinction have lately learned to cover their faces with silken masks and vizards and feathers".{{sfnp|Arnold|1988|p=12}}

Elizabeth I had masks lined with perfumed leather and made with satin supplied by Baptist Hicks. In September 1602, she was observed wearing a mask while walking in the garden at Oatlands Palace.{{sfnp|Arnold|1988|p=12}} In 1620 the lawyer and courtier John Coke sent clothes and costume to his wife, including a satin mask and two green masks for their children.{{sfnp|HMC|1888|p=108}}

In Scotland in the 1590s, Anne of Denmark wore masks when horse riding to protect her complexion from the sun.{{sfnp|Pearce|2019}} These were faced with black satin, lined with taffeta, and supplied with Florentine ribbon for fastening and for decoration.{{sfnp|Field|2019}} On some later public occasions she did not wear a mask outdoors. In June 1603, after she travelled to England for the Union of Crowns, John Chamberlain said she had done "some wrong" to her complexion "for in all this journey she hath worn no mask".{{sfnp|Lee|1972|pp=34-5}} In September, Arbella Stuart praised her for greeting the populace at Newbury with "thankful countenance barefaced to the great contentment of native and foreign people."{{sfnp|Steen|1994|p=184}} When the Spanish ambassador Juan Fernández de Velasco y Tovar, 5th Duke of Frías, arrived by ship to negotiate the Treaty of London the following year, Anne wore a black mask while observing from a barge on the Thames.{{sfnp|Anonymous|1604|p=22}}{{sfnp|Green|1856|p=141}}

Visards often formed part of costumes for masques at the Stuart court. Henrietta Maria employed a visard maker, John King. He provided masks of coloured leather, and "Venetian" visards, a term which may refer to an Italian technique of modelling soft leather.{{sfnp|Ravelhofer|2006|p=175}}

Visards experienced a resurgence in the 1660s. In 1663, after attending a play at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, Samuel Pepys noted in his diary that as the venue began to fill, Mary Cromwell "put on her vizard, and so kept it on all the play; which of late is become a great fashion among the ladies, which hides their whole face." Later that day, he bought a vizard for his wife.{{sfnp|Pepys|1967}}

==See also== * 1550–1600 in Western European fashion * Facekini

== Citations == {{reflist|20em}}

== References == {{refbegin}} * {{cite book | title = Queen Elizabeth's Wardrobe Unlock'd | last = Arnold | first = Janet | publisher = Maney | year = 1988 | page = 12 | isbn = 9780901286208 }} * {{cite book | title = Relacion de la Jornada de Condestable de Castilla en Londres 1604 | year = 1604 | location = Antwerp | ref = {{SfnRef|Anonymous|1604}} }}  * {{cite book | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=tlH7xI1M4GwC | title = Elizabethan England | last = Elgin | first = Kathy | publisher = Infobase Publishing | year = 2005 | page = 38 | isbn = 9781438121239 }} * {{cite journal | author-first = Jemma | author-last = Field | author-link = Jemma Field | title = Dressing a Queen: The Wardrobe of Anna of Denmark at the Scottish Court | journal = The Court Historian | volume = 24 | issue = 2 | date = August 2019 | doi = 10.1080/14629712.2019.1626120 | p = 163 }} * {{cite book | title = Calendar of state papers, Domestic series, of the reign of James I. 1603—1610 | editor-first = Mary Anne Everett | editor-last = Green | editor-link = Mary Anne Everett Green | publisher = Public Record Office | year = 1856 | location = London | url = https://archive.org/details/calendarstatepa00greegoog }} * {{cite book | title = Twelfth Report of the Historical Manuscripts Commission, Appendix, Part I. The Manuscripts of the Earl Cowper, K.G., Preserved at Melbourne Hall, Derbyshire | author = Historical Manuscripts Commission | publisher = Eyre and Spottiswoode | year = 1888 | volume = 1 | location = London | url = https://archive.org/details/manuscriptsofea01grea | ref = {{SfnRef|HMC|1888}} }} * {{cite book | title = The Academie of Armorie | last = Holme | first = Randal | authorlink = Randle Holme#Randle Holme III (1627–1700) | year = 1688 | quote = A mask [is] a thing that in former times Gentlewomen used to put over their Faces when they travel to keep them from Sun burning... the Visard Mask, which covers the whole face, having holes for the eyes, a case for the nose, and a slit for the mouth, and to speak through; this kind of Mask is taken off and put in a moment of time, being only held in the Teeth by means of a round bead fastened on the inside over against the mouth. }} * {{cite book | title = Costume in the Drama of Shakespeare and his Contemporaries | author-first = M. Channing | author-last = Linthicum | publisher = Clarendon Press | location = Oxford | year = 1936 | url = https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.184243 }} * {{cite web | url = http://finds.org.uk/database/artefacts/record/id/402520 | title = Mask | year = 2010 | publisher = Portable Antiquities Scheme | ref = {{SfnRef|Portable Antiquities Scheme|2010}} | access-date = 2013-10-06 | archive-date = 2013-07-29 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20130729185322/http://finds.org.uk/database/artefacts/record/id/402520 | url-status = dead }} * {{cite book | title = Dudley Carleton to John Chamberlain, 1603-1624 | author-first = Maurice | author-last = Lee | publisher = Rutgers University Press | location = New Brunswick | year = 1972 | url = https://archive.org/details/dudleycarletonto0000carl }} * {{cite book | title = Viaje de Felipe Segundo á Inglaterra | author-first = Andrés. | author-last = Muñoz | editor-first = Pascual | editor-last = de Gayangos | publisher = Imprenta de Aribau y C.a | location = Madrid | year = 1877 | url = https://archive.org/details/viajedefelipese00mugoog }} * {{cite journal | title = Anna of Denmark: Fashioning a Danish Court in Scotland | author-first = Michael | author-last = Pearce | journal = The Court Historian | volume = 24 | issue = 2 | date = August 2019 | doi = 10.1080/14629712.2019.1626110 | p = 142 }} * {{cite book | title = The Diary of Samuel Pepys | author-first = Samuel | author-last = Pepys | author-link = Samuel Pepys | editor-first = Richard | editor-last = Le Gallienne | editor-link = Richard Le Gallienne | chapter = June 12, 1663 | publisher = The Modern Library | year = 1967 | location = New York City }} On Wikisource: {{ws |''Diary of Samuel Pepys'', Friday, 12 June 1663}} * {{cite book | title=The Early Stuart Masque: Dance, Costume, and Music | first1 = Barbara | last1 = Ravelhofer | year = 2006 | publisher = Oxford University Press | isbn = 9780199559251 }} * {{cite book | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=zwzqAAAAMAAJ | title = The mask of Venice: masking, theater & identity in the art of Tiepolo & his time | first1 = James Christen | last1 = Steward | first2 = George | last2 = Knox | year = 1996 | publisher = Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive | isbn = 9780295976112 }} * {{cite book | title = The Letters of Lady Arbella Stuart | author-first = Arbella | author-last = Stuart | author-link = Lady Arbella Stuart | editor-first = Sara Jayne | editor-last = Steen | year = 1994 | publisher = Oxford University Press | url = https://archive.org/details/lettersofladyarb0000stua | ref = {{SfnRef|Steen|1994}} }} * {{cite book | title = Masks and Masking in Medieval and Early Modern England | first1 = Meg | last1 = Twycross | first2 = Sarah | last2 = Carpenter | year = 2002 | publisher = Ashgate | isbn = 0754602303 }} {{refend}}

==External links== * [http://www.culturalmodes.norfolk.gov.uk/projects/nmaspub5.asp?page=item&itemId=NWHCM%20:%201992.205%20:%20C Details of a visard] in the collection of the Norwich Castle Museum * [https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O82639/dolls-mask-unknown/ A miniature visard made for a 17th-century child's doll] in the collection of the Victoria and Albert Museum * Anne Daye, [https://www.earlydancecircle.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/2006-Anne-Daye-Masquing-vizards.pdf "Masquing vizards", ''Masks, Masques and Masquerades: A Living Tradition'' (Early Dance Circle, 2006), pp. 19–22]

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Category:16th-century fashion Category:16th century in Europe Category:17th-century fashion Category:17th century in Europe Category:Masks