Lace, it has a violent history involving death, blindness
and smuggling. It is hard for me to
envision lace having such a dark past. I first became aware of it when I read
the book, The Ruins of Lace by Iris
Anthony. Frankly at the mention of lace my mind goes directly to my wedding
dress.
There are no definite dates for its origin, but what we
identify as lace came about in the early sixteenth century. There are several sources at this time which
tell us that poor children were taught lacemaking in an attempt to make them self-supporting
and in England their teacher was paid 2 pence for each child per week. A
teacher would hold classes in a room of her cottage while she also supervised
the more proficient in the production of saleable lace. In 1699 a child of six
or seven could earn 1 shilling and 8 pence a week and a good adult 6 shillings
and 6 pence.
A working day at
this time would have been from 6 am through to 7 or 8 pm and after dark, 4
lacemakers would be sat around a small table on which one candle would be
burning. Between each lacemaker and the candle, a glass flask of water would
magnify the light from the candle and focus it onto the lace pillow to
illuminate a tiny part of the work. On fine summer days groups of women would
work outside but on winter days it was a different matter. Open fires were not
allowed because the smoke from them would discolour and dirty the lace, so clay
or metal pots filled with hot coals would be positioned under the women's
skirts to keep them warm. Unfortunately these hot coals could also set fire to
the lacemakers clothing. Another way of keeping warm was to work in a room
above a barn so that the warmth from the animals below heated the working room
above. Many women and children actually went blind from making lace because of
the poor lighting and hours they were forced to work.
Smuggling of lace
was always a problem for the authorities and it was amazing the lengths people
would go to indulge their passion for lace. It came into countries in coffins,
wrapped around the corpses of expatriates, including an Archbishop of
Westminster. In some cases, only the head, hands and feet of the deceased would
be found in the coffin, the rest of the body had been discarded to make room
for more lace. Some was wound around small pet dogs, which were swaddled in fur
wraps in attempts to avoid detection. Another method was to hollow out loaves
of bread and yet another was to bring it into the country with the smuggled
brandy by the 'Gentlemen'. Rudyard Kipling wrote a poem called 'The Gentlemen,
in which he mentioned 'Brandy for the Parson, Baccy for the clerk, Laces for a
Lady, Letters for a spy', in the second verse and 'French dolls trimmed with
Valenciennes lace' in the third. Penalties for smuggling were very heavy but
the commodity was so valuable that many thought the risk well worth taking, even
milady would smuggle lace into the country hidden in her muff.
Over the centuries, bodies on the battlefields of Europe were searched in the hope that valuable lace would be found and one writing suggested that the officers went into battle wearing lace because they wouldn't be seen dead without it.
Over the centuries, bodies on the battlefields of Europe were searched in the hope that valuable lace would be found and one writing suggested that the officers went into battle wearing lace because they wouldn't be seen dead without it.
So the challenge for today is to write about lace. You
can choose to write about its dark side, a wedding dress, grandma’s table cloth,
curtains, doilies, clothing, sensual references, etc. Please create an original
piece for this challenge, add it to Mr. Linky and visit your fellow poets to
read their lace inspired poetry.
