THE EVERYDAY LIFE OF NOBILITY THE RZECZPOSPOLITA (COMMONWEALTH) IN THE 17TH AND 18TH CENTURIES: HAIRSTYLE, BEAUTY TOOLS AND CLOTHES

Abstract

The purpose of the article is: an analysis of the literature sources according to which the specifics of the fashion on wearing costumes, coating, using perfumery by the representatives of the Polish and Ukrainian nobility in the 17^th and 18^th centuries has been reconstructed as well as the portraits of the representatives of gentry of baroque epoch have been researched. The research methodology includes the application of a set of the following methods: dialectical, axiological, hermeneutic, idiographic, prosopographic, comparative, micro-history, biographical. Inductive and deductive methods have been also used to reconstruct certain historical events according to historiographical sources. The scientific novelty consists in introducing aspects of wearing clothes in the circles of the Polish and Ukrainian establishment in the 17th and 18th centuries, connected to the semantic field of “balagula”, “tęźyzna”, “courteous love” and escort “сhichisbeys”. The evolution of stereotypes changes in traditions of wearing representative clothes the Polish and Ukrainian Commonwealth at the Baroque epoch in the circles of old Polish gentry. Their dependence on the inherited norms and customs is characterized, estate regulations on the right on wearing bright, decorated with gold and silver kuntush, grey kuntush, belts, decorated with “positive” historical, political and socio-cultural transformations of society under the conditions of several partitions of Poland at the end of the eighteenth century. The Conclusion: It was established that the institution of “balagulism”, which was known in the Ukrainian and Polish historiography of the nineteenth century, concerned not only the circles of young Poles-populists of the 1840s – 1850s, but also it was born in the late eighteenth century as a certain subculture with appropriate external indicators in costume and behaviour. It has been proved that representatives of the nobility of the Baroque era paid special attention to the concept of “tęźizna” in the sense of courage, strength, dignity and other virtues of the real elite, which they tried to demonstrate by conservative elements of clothing – most often the kuntush outfit, which was taken among the Polish aristocrats as a national costume, and in the Ukrainian circles – as belonging to Sarmatia. It has been found out that the everyday life of the Polish and Ukrainian nobility included certain markers of identity associated with the “reconstruction” according to the old Polish cultural tradition of the clothes of the Renaissance period – mannerism, as well as typical Kyiv uniform-kuntush costumes, Warsaw, Krakow customary norms, in accordance with the fashion trends of certain periods of time and certain requirements of savoir-vivre (etiquette). Frivolity in the women's tradition of mistresses and favorites of kings and representatives of the Sejm and generality in the circles of the Polish and Ukrainian aristocracy of Lviv is demonstrated at the end of the 18th century. Their references to the institute of courtesans, known in Europe from the Renaissance and appealing on the one hand to the harem culture of the Turks, the Persians, etc., and on the other, the implementation of the era of sexual emancipation and emancipation into the Polish and Ukrainian society of free tempers of France have been elucidated. Specific features of the ranks for balls, receptions, secular events and exits of ladies from the circles of the Polish and Ukrainian nobility of the Baroque era and their сhichisbeys escorts, derived from the Italian culture of the Baroque epoch, have been reconstructed. A number of portraits of the Polish and Ukrainian elite of the 17th – 18th centuries have been analyzed, which represent the connection of the contemporary everyday life of models with sources of inspirations related to various traditions of including Venetian buttons, references to Spanish dresses, tightly laced German dresses. Among them there are highlighted elements of Hungarian, oriental (primarily Persian, Turkish, Chinese) costumes, fabrics or its patterns, French, Italian, Spanish, English fabrics, primarily silk; elements of hairstyles and hats (Spanish beard, French-style wigs, hijab, close to Oriental Muslim cultures, men's outfits of the Hungarian ranks, French perfumes, coating, stockings, shoes, Dutch pipes.