![]() Early Middle Ages, blue was associated with darkness, evil.By the 1300s, peasants owned blue Medieval clothing due to woad dye being readily available.A lover wears blue for fidelity (late Middle Ages).In the late Middle Ages, blue replaced royal purple in the mantle of the Virgin Mary and robes and heraldry (especially in France).Indigo or deep blue means chastity in the sacred sphere.Servants or members of a City company were to wear bright blue or gray Renaissance clothing. In England, blue was the traditional color of servitude.Light blue represented a young marriageable woman.Greens - Medieval – nothing currently noted.Late 1300s in Venice, a prostitute is known by her yellow dress.In later Middle Ages, a harmonious color expressing the balance between the red of justice and the white of compassion.In Venice, Jews were required to sew a yellow circle onto clothing.In almost all Italian cities, a prostitute was required to wear yellow.Oranges - Medieval - nothing currently noted.The peasants and middle ranked persons imitated upper class reds by dyeing their Renaissance clothes with cheaper orange-red and russet dyes.The color of kings, identified with kingly virtues of valor and success in war.Sometimes the color of the Virgin Mary’s robes.Also, protection: red thread to ward off witches, red coral necklaces to guard against illness. A sign of otherworldly power in European legends and folktales.’A lover wears vermilion, like blood’ (later Middle Ages).At the universities of Padua and Bologna, red was symbolic of medicine. ![]() Also, could symbolize the satanic and color of hellfire. In the Church, red was a symbol of authority, Pentecostal fire, the blood of Christ, martyrdom, crucifixion, Christian charity.Cosmopolitan man with access to international trading centers.Worn by judges and similar persons (Scotland, the Holy Roman Empire, England’s Court of Common Pleas, occasionally by peers in English Parliament) royal magistrates, king’s chancellor (France) high government posts (Venice and Florence).High social status, royalty, gentlemen, men of justice.The list below, while not comprehensive, does provide ideas from secondary sources about what different colors represented and how they were used. So, consider yourself forewarned about the vagaries of color symbolism in clothing. Even during the Renaissance and Medieval periods, the meanings of colors were debated (more about this below the list). The meaning of colors is not a simple and exact body of knowledge. It also describes the colors worn by certain members of society. This post is designed to meet the needs of people looking for the symbolic meanings of Medieval and Renaissance clothing colors. ![]()
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