Folk Dress in Europe and Anatolia Beliefs about Protection and Fertility

This absorbing and disciplinary book examines dress in a broad range of folk cultures from Turkey, Greece, and Slovakia to Norway, Latvia and Lithuania and others. The authors reveal the connection between folk dress and ancient myths, cults and ritual, as well as the communicative aspects of folk dress. It examines how an individual dressed in a certain way is placed within a community and also how a community is defined, whether it be of women, the village, the larger geographic area, or the nation. The intriguing connections between dress and the supernatural beliefs of agrarian communities, as well as the reinvention of such beliefs of agrarian communities as a part of nationalism is discussed. This book represents a significant contribution to the growing body of literature on the cultural meanings of dress, as well as to material culture, anthropology, folklore, art history, ethnohistory, and linguistics.