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By Geographical Region & Time Period

• 
  Statuette of Nike (personification of victory), late 5th century B.C.; Classical
  Greek
  Terracotta; H. 7 in. (17.8 cm)
  Rogers Fund, 1907 (07.286.23)
  
• 
  Grave stele of a little girl, ca. 450–440 B.C.
  Greek
  Parian marble; H. 31 1/2 in. (80 cm)
  Fletcher Fund, 1927 (27.45)
  
• 
  Statue of a young woman and a girl from a grave monument, ca. 320 B.C.
  Greek, Attic
  Marble; H. of woman 56 7/8 in. (144.5 cm), H. of girl 40 1/2 in. (102.9 cm)
  Rogers Fund, 1944 (44.11.2,3)
  
• 
  Statuette of a veiled and masked dancer, Hellenistic, 3rd–2nd century B.C.
  Greek
  Bronze; H. 8 1/16 in. (20.5 cm)
  Bequest of Walter C. Baker, 1971 (1972.118.95)
  
• 
  Statue of a wounded Amazon, 1st–2nd century A.D.
  Roman copy of a Greek bronze statue, ca. 450–425 B.C.
  Marble (Pentelic); H. 80 1/4 in. (203.84 cm)
  Gift of John D. Rockefeller, Jr., 1932 (32.11.4)
  
• 
  Bell-krater (bowl for mixing wine and water) , ca. 440 B.C.; Red-figure
  Attributed to the Persephone Painter
  Greek, Attic
  Terracotta; H. 16 1/8 in. (41 cm)
  Fletcher Fund, 1928 (28.57.23)
  
  Obverse: The return of Persephone
  Reverse: Libation scene
  
• 
  Dinner dress, 1922–23
  Paul Poiret (French, 1879–1944)
  Navy-blue and red silk faille, gold metallic bullion buttons
  Gift of Mrs. Muriel Draper, 1943 (C.I.43.85.2a,b)
  
• 
  Statue of a woman, second half of 4th century B.C.
  Greek
  Marble; H. 68 1/8 in. (173.02 cm)
  Gift of Mrs. Frederick F. Thompson, 1903 (03.12.17)
  
• 
  Victory, 1892–1903; this cast, 1914 or after (by 1916)
  Augustus Saint-Gaudens (American, 1848–1907)
  Bronze, gilt; 38 x 9 1/2 x 18 1/2 in. (96.5 x 24.1 x 47 cm)
  Rogers Fund, 1917 (17.90.1)
  
• 
  Fragments of the Great Eleusinian Relief, 27 B.C.–14 A.D.; Augustan
  Fragments of a Roman copy set in a plaster cast of the original Greek marble relief, ca. 450–425 B.C.
  Marble; H. 89 3/8 in. (227 cm)
  Rogers Fund, 1914 (14.130.9)
  
• 
  The Pleiades, 1885
  Elihu Vedder (American, 1836–1923)
  Oil on canvas; 24 1/8 x 37 5/8 in. (61.3 x 95.6 cm)
  Gift of George A. Hearn, 1910 (10.64.13)
  
• 
  Relief with a dancing maenad, ca. 27 B.C.–14 A.D.; Augustan
  Roman copy of a Greek relief attributed to Kallimachos, ca. 425–400 B.C.
  Pentelic marble; H. 56 5/16 in. (143.03 cm)
  Fletcher Fund, 1935 (35.11.3)
  
• 
  Ensemble, 1920s
  Raymond Duncan (American, 1874–1966)
  Tussah silk with polychrome hand-painted vegetal motif and wood beads, navy-blue silk chiffon; L. at center back 58 5/8 in. (148.9 cm)
  Isabel Shults Fund, 1990 (1990.152)
  
• 
  Dress, late 1920s–late 1940s
  Mariano Fortuny (Spanish, 1871–1949)
  Rust pleated silk, brown and gray silk velvet printed with metallic silver
  Gift of Clare Fahnestock Moorehead, 2001 (2001.702a–c)
  
• 
  Dress, 1940
  Madame Grès (French, 1903–1993)
  Evening gown with peplum, silk jersey; 7 7/16 x 9 7/16 in. (18.9 x 23.9 cm)
  Photograph: George Platt Lynes (American, 1907–1955), gelatin silver print, 1940
  Permission courtesy of George P. Lynes, II, Executor, Estate of George Platt Lynes
  David Hunter McAlpin Fund, 1941 (41.65.2)
  
• 

  Evening gown, ca. 1965
  Madame Grès (French, 1903–1993)
  White silk jersey; L. at center back 44 in. (111.8 cm)
  Gift of Mrs. Oscar de la Renta, 1994 (1994.192.12)

• 
  Evening gown, 1967–85
  Madame Grès (French, 1903–1993)
  Cream silk jersey; (a) L. at center back 16 in. (40.6 cm), (b) L. at center back 46 in. (116.9 cm), (c) L. 25 1/4 in. (64.2 cm)
  Gift of Chessy Rayner, 1997 (1997.116.38a-c)
  
• 
  Evening gown with wrap, 1974
  Halston (Roy Halston Frowick) (American, 1932–1990)
  Pleated ivory and beige silk chiffon; L. at center back (a) and (b) 60 in. (152.4 cm)
  Gift of Hillie (Mrs. David) Mahoney, 1996 (1996.498.2a,b)
  
• 
  Evening gown, 1978
  Madame Grès (French, 1903–1993)
  Green silk jersey and green silk velvet; (a) L. at center back 59 in. (149.8 cm), (b) L. at center front 29 in. (73.7 cm)
  Gift of Chessy Rayner, 1997 (1997.116.1a,b)
  
• 
  Statue of Eirene (personification of peace), ca. 14–68 A.D.; Julio-Claudian
  Roman copy of a Greek bronze statue by Kephisodotos, ca. 375/374–360/359 B.C.
  Marble; H. without plinth 69 3/4 in. (177.17 cm)
  Rogers Fund, 1906 (06.311)
  

In the absence of any surviving clothing, art and literature provide the only evidence of classical dress, opening a Pandora's box of confusion and contradiction. Even in its own day, the apparel of ancient Greece was subject to numerous modifications and transformations. In the huge variety of costumes delineated in artworks and categorized by scholars, exceptions are rife and consistency is elusive. Because specialists of the high classical period of ancient Greece have developed terminology based on a variety of methodologies—art historical, archaeological, and literary—certain discrepancies are perhaps inevitable. However, in every instance, the glossaries are also a simplified system, identifying numerous and specific forms of dress under quite general labels. Here the nomenclature is simplified even further, originating from the structure of the garment rather than from any other criteria.

The diversity of women's apparel in ancient Greece can be reduced to three general garment types: the chiton, the peplos, and the himation (28.57.23).

Structurally, the most elemental dress type is the chiton, which is constructed in several ways. The most commonly represented is accomplished by stitching two rectangular pieces of fabric together along either sideseam, from top to bottom, forming a cylinder with its top edge and hem unstitched. The top edges are then sewn, pinned, or buttoned together at two or more points to form shoulder seams, with reserve openings for the head and arms.

The peplos (06.311; C.I.43.85.2a,b) is perhaps a more distinctively Greek garment than the chiton, insofar as the chiton's reductive construction has similarities to apparel types in a number of other cultures and times. However, the peplos has several characteristics that distinguish it from other clothing traditions. Made of one large rectangular piece of cloth, it was formed into a cylinder and then folded along the topline into a deep cuff, creating an apoptygma, or capelet-like overfold. Although there are rare instances of chitons represented with overfolds, a garment is not a peplos unless it has been draped with an apoptygma. The neckline and armholes of the peplos were formed by fibulae, broochlike pins that attached the back to the front of the garment at either shoulder. Of all the identifying characteristics of a peplos, the fastening of its shoulders with fibulae is its single defining detail.

While there are a number of scarf, veil, shawl, and mantle forms, each with a distinct nomenclature, it is the himation with its range of draping and wrapping possibilities that has been the most evident source of later evocations of Hellenistic dress (1972.118.95; 1996.498.2a,b). The himation was a large cloak, always orthogonal, unlike the Roman toga, which had some shaping. Like the toga, however, it appears to have had a variety of cultural meanings, depending on its proportion and how it was worn. Generally, when worn by women, it was a garment of decorous modesty, but it has been shown on hetaerae as a device for provocation.

The diminishing number of paradigmatic Grecian dress types belies the artistic and literary evidence. But it may be that in the narrowing of types, their potency as carriers of ideals of the antique became even more concentrated over time. It is in the variation and manipulation of a reduced number of basic iconic styles that later artists and contemporary designers have been able to expand on their increasingly inventive interpretations of Grecian dress.

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The Chiton, Peplos, and Himation in Modern Dress

• 
  Statuette of Nike (personification of victory), late 5th century B.C.; Classical
  Greek
  Terracotta; H. 7 in. (17.8 cm)
  Rogers Fund, 1907 (07.286.23)
  
• 
  Grave stele of a little girl, ca. 450–440 B.C.
  Greek
  Parian marble; H. 31 1/2 in. (80 cm)
  Fletcher Fund, 1927 (27.45)
  
• 
  Statue of a young woman and a girl from a grave monument, ca. 320 B.C.
  Greek, Attic
  Marble; H. of woman 56 7/8 in. (144.5 cm), H. of girl 40 1/2 in. (102.9 cm)
  Rogers Fund, 1944 (44.11.2,3)
  
• 
  Statuette of a veiled and masked dancer, Hellenistic, 3rd–2nd century B.C.
  Greek
  Bronze; H. 8 1/16 in. (20.5 cm)
  Bequest of Walter C. Baker, 1971 (1972.118.95)
  
• 
  Statue of a wounded Amazon, 1st–2nd century A.D.
  Roman copy of a Greek bronze statue, ca. 450–425 B.C.
  Marble (Pentelic); H. 80 1/4 in. (203.84 cm)
  Gift of John D. Rockefeller, Jr., 1932 (32.11.4)
  
• 
  Bell-krater (bowl for mixing wine and water) , ca. 440 B.C.; Red-figure
  Attributed to the Persephone Painter
  Greek, Attic
  Terracotta; H. 16 1/8 in. (41 cm)
  Fletcher Fund, 1928 (28.57.23)
  
  Obverse: The return of Persephone
  Reverse: Libation scene
  
• 
  Dinner dress, 1922–23
  Paul Poiret (French, 1879–1944)
  Navy-blue and red silk faille, gold metallic bullion buttons
  Gift of Mrs. Muriel Draper, 1943 (C.I.43.85.2a,b)
  
• 
  Statue of a woman, second half of 4th century B.C.
  Greek
  Marble; H. 68 1/8 in. (173.02 cm)
  Gift of Mrs. Frederick F. Thompson, 1903 (03.12.17)
  
• 
  Victory, 1892–1903; this cast, 1914 or after (by 1916)
  Augustus Saint-Gaudens (American, 1848–1907)
  Bronze, gilt; 38 x 9 1/2 x 18 1/2 in. (96.5 x 24.1 x 47 cm)
  Rogers Fund, 1917 (17.90.1)
  
• 
  Fragments of the Great Eleusinian Relief, 27 B.C.–14 A.D.; Augustan
  Fragments of a Roman copy set in a plaster cast of the original Greek marble relief, ca. 450–425 B.C.
  Marble; H. 89 3/8 in. (227 cm)
  Rogers Fund, 1914 (14.130.9)
  
• 
  The Pleiades, 1885
  Elihu Vedder (American, 1836–1923)
  Oil on canvas; 24 1/8 x 37 5/8 in. (61.3 x 95.6 cm)
  Gift of George A. Hearn, 1910 (10.64.13)
  
• 
  Relief with a dancing maenad, ca. 27 B.C.–14 A.D.; Augustan
  Roman copy of a Greek relief attributed to Kallimachos, ca. 425–400 B.C.
  Pentelic marble; H. 56 5/16 in. (143.03 cm)
  Fletcher Fund, 1935 (35.11.3)
  
• 
  Ensemble, 1920s
  Raymond Duncan (American, 1874–1966)
  Tussah silk with polychrome hand-painted vegetal motif and wood beads, navy-blue silk chiffon; L. at center back 58 5/8 in. (148.9 cm)
  Isabel Shults Fund, 1990 (1990.152)
  
• 
  Dress, late 1920s–late 1940s
  Mariano Fortuny (Spanish, 1871–1949)
  Rust pleated silk, brown and gray silk velvet printed with metallic silver
  Gift of Clare Fahnestock Moorehead, 2001 (2001.702a–c)
  
• 
  Dress, 1940
  Madame Grès (French, 1903–1993)
  Evening gown with peplum, silk jersey; 7 7/16 x 9 7/16 in. (18.9 x 23.9 cm)
  Photograph: George Platt Lynes (American, 1907–1955), gelatin silver print, 1940
  Permission courtesy of George P. Lynes, II, Executor, Estate of George Platt Lynes
  David Hunter McAlpin Fund, 1941 (41.65.2)
  
• 

  Evening gown, ca. 1965
  Madame Grès (French, 1903–1993)
  White silk jersey; L. at center back 44 in. (111.8 cm)
  Gift of Mrs. Oscar de la Renta, 1994 (1994.192.12)

• 
  Evening gown, 1967–85
  Madame Grès (French, 1903–1993)
  Cream silk jersey; (a) L. at center back 16 in. (40.6 cm), (b) L. at center back 46 in. (116.9 cm), (c) L. 25 1/4 in. (64.2 cm)
  Gift of Chessy Rayner, 1997 (1997.116.38a-c)
  
• 
  Evening gown with wrap, 1974
  Halston (Roy Halston Frowick) (American, 1932–1990)
  Pleated ivory and beige silk chiffon; L. at center back (a) and (b) 60 in. (152.4 cm)
  Gift of Hillie (Mrs. David) Mahoney, 1996 (1996.498.2a,b)
  
• 
  Evening gown, 1978
  Madame Grès (French, 1903–1993)
  Green silk jersey and green silk velvet; (a) L. at center back 59 in. (149.8 cm), (b) L. at center front 29 in. (73.7 cm)
  Gift of Chessy Rayner, 1997 (1997.116.1a,b)
  
• 
  Statue of Eirene (personification of peace), ca. 14–68 A.D.; Julio-Claudian
  Roman copy of a Greek bronze statue by Kephisodotos, ca. 375/374–360/359 B.C.
  Marble; H. without plinth 69 3/4 in. (177.17 cm)
  Rogers Fund, 1906 (06.311)
  

View SlideshowView Thumbnails

In the absence of any surviving clothing, art and literature provide the only evidence of classical dress, opening a Pandora's box of confusion and contradiction. Even in its own day, the apparel of ancient Greece was subject to numerous modifications and transformations. In the huge variety of costumes delineated in artworks and categorized by scholars, exceptions are rife and consistency is elusive. Because specialists of the high classical period of ancient Greece have developed terminology based on a variety of methodologies—art historical, archaeological, and literary—certain discrepancies are perhaps inevitable. However, in every instance, the glossaries are also a simplified system, identifying numerous and specific forms of dress under quite general labels. Here the nomenclature is simplified even further, originating from the structure of the garment rather than from any other criteria.

In the absence of any surviving clothing, art and literature provide the only evidence of classical dress, opening a Pandora's box of confusion and contradiction.

Related

Timelines (3)

• Ancient Greece, 1000 b.c.–1 a.d.
• Italian Peninsula, 1000 b.c.–1 a.d.
• Italian Peninsula, 1900 a.d.–present

Primary Thematic Essays (12)

• Classical Art and Modern Dress
• Classicism in Modern Dress
• Contemporary Deconstructions of Classical Dress
• Paul Poiret (1879–1944)

Other Thematic Essays (66)

• Ancient Greek Dress
• Athenian Vase Painting: Black- and Red-Figure Techniques
• Classical Antiquity in the Middle Ages
• Classical Cyprus (ca. 480
• Costume in The Metropolitan Museum of Art
• Death, Burial, and the Afterlife in Ancient Greece
• Eighteenth-Century Silhouette and Support
• Greek Gods and Religious Practices
• List of Rulers of Europe
• List of Rulers of the Ancient Greek World
• Neoclassicism
• Nineteenth-Century Silhouette and Support
• Retrospective Style in Greek and Roman Sculpture
• Roman Copies of Greek Statues
• Scenes of Everyday Life in Ancient Greece
• The Art of Classical Greece (ca. 480–323 B.C.)
• The Greek Key and Divine Attributes in Modern Dress
• The Rediscovery of Classical Antiquity
• The Symposium in Ancient Greece
• The Technique of Bronze Statuary in Ancient Greece
• Twentieth-Century Silhouette and Support
• Women in Classical Greece

Maps (9)

• Europe, 1000 B.C.-1 A.D.
• Europe, 1900 A.D.-present
• World, 1000 B.C.-1 A.D.

Index Terms (130)

Artist

• Duncan, Raymond (American, 1874–1966)
• Fortuny, Mariano (Spanish, 1871–1949)
• Halston, or Roy Halston Frowick (American, 1932–1990)
• Kallimachos (Greek, active 2nd half of 5th century b.c.)
• Madame Grès (French, 1903–1993)
• Persephone Painter
• Poiret, Paul (French, 1879–1944)
• Saint–Gaudens, Augustus (American, 1848–1907)
• Vedder, Elihu (American, 1836–1923)

Geography/Place

• The Balkan Peninsula
• The Italian Peninsula
• Central Italy and Florence
• Southern Italy and Rome
• Nineteenth–Century European Art
• Twentieth–Century European Art
• Rome (Ancient)
• Nineteenth–Century Art from the United States
• Twentieth–Century Art from the United States

Material and Technique

• Plaster
• Textile in Velvet

Object

• Dress
• Children's Clothing
• Men's Clothing
• Women's Clothing from Europe
• Women's Clothing from North America

Subject Matter/Theme

• Women Artists from Europe

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The diversity of women's apparel in ancient Greece can be reduced to three general garment types: the chiton, the peplos, and the himation (28.57.23).




Structurally, the most elemental dress type is the chiton, which is constructed in several ways. The most commonly represented is accomplished by stitching two rectangular pieces of fabric together along either sideseam, from top to bottom, forming a cylinder with its top edge and hem unstitched. The top edges are then sewn, pinned, or buttoned together at two or more points to form shoulder seams, with reserve openings for the head and arms.




The peplos (06.311; C.I.43.85.2a,b) is perhaps a more distinctively Greek garment than the chiton, insofar as the chiton's reductive construction has similarities to apparel types in a number of other cultures and times. However, the peplos has several characteristics that distinguish it from other clothing traditions. Made of one large rectangular piece of cloth, it was formed into a cylinder and then folded along the topline into a deep cuff, creating an apoptygma, or capelet-like overfold. Although there are rare instances of chitons represented with overfolds, a garment is not a peplos unless it has been draped with an apoptygma. The neckline and armholes of the peplos were formed by fibulae, broochlike pins that attached the back to the front of the garment at either shoulder. Of all the identifying characteristics of a peplos, the fastening of its shoulders with fibulae is its single defining detail.




While there are a number of scarf, veil, shawl, and mantle forms, each with a distinct nomenclature, it is the himation with its range of draping and wrapping possibilities that has been the most evident source of later evocations of Hellenistic dress (1972.118.95; 1996.498.2a,b). The himation was a large cloak, always orthogonal, unlike the Roman toga, which had some shaping. Like the toga, however, it appears to have had a variety of cultural meanings, depending on its proportion and how it was worn. Generally, when worn by women, it was a garment of decorous modesty, but it has been shown on hetaerae as a device for provocation.




The diminishing number of paradigmatic Grecian dress types belies the artistic and literary evidence. But it may be that in the narrowing of types, their potency as carriers of ideals of the antique became even more concentrated over time. It is in the variation and manipulation of a reduced number of basic iconic styles that later artists and contemporary designers have been able to expand on their increasingly inventive interpretations of Grecian dress.



Harold Koda The Costume Institute, The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Citation Koda, Harold. "The Chiton, Peplos, and Himation in Modern Dress". In Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2000–. http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/god3/hd_god3.htm (October 2003) Further Reading Koda, Harold Goddess: The Classical Mode. Exhibition catalogue.. New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2003. Related exhibitions and online features Special Exhibitions (including upcoming, current, and past exhibitions)