Folklore: Dress colours??

Subject: RE: Folklore: Dress colours??
From: fogie
Date: 15 Dec 03 - 12:19 PM

The City Waits used to sing a song called "give me my yellow hose again" which was a lament for the single life in wedlock. I note Martha Rowdens stockings are Green and Yellow. I dont know there's a link you understand, but maybe one of their legs tends to be fairy, and the other longs for action?

Subject: RE: Folklore: Dress colours??
From: Hrothgar
Date: 15 Dec 03 - 05:00 AM

My mum told me (and I never asked how she knew) that red shoes were known as "nigger catchers" during the Second World War - around Brisbane, anyway.

The reason was that the common ladies who frequented the areas to which US negro servicemen were restricted allegedly wore red shoes to advertise their calling.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Dress colours??
From: fat B****rd
Date: 15 Dec 03 - 03:15 AM

I'm with you, Mouldy. "Red'at no drawers" was a phrase I heard in my North Lincs. youth.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Dress colours??
From: GUEST,JTT
Date: 15 Dec 03 - 03:10 AM

I'll dye my petticoat a burning red
And round the world I'll earn my bread
Until my parents shall wish me dead
Is go dtéigh tú, a mhúirnín, slán.

Makes it pretty clear what's in question, doesn't it? On the other hand, the women of the west of Ireland wored "red petticoats" (red wool skirts, dyed with a particular kind of lichen to make them a rich red) as their normal costume, and heaven knows these were deeply respectable women.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Dress colours??
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 10:41 PM

Thanks for the clarification on Light Bob, Walrus. We can take that as settled, then.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Dress colours??
From: Joybell
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 08:31 PM

Well it's off with the red flannel drawers then! I want to live forever.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Dress colours??
From: The Walrus
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 08:03 PM

Re: the earlier references to 'Light Bobs'.

'Light Bobs' is a traditional nickname for soldiers of 'Light Infantry' regiments and extended to 'Light' Cavalry (Light Dragoons, Hussars, Lancers etc.).

Walrus

Subject: RE: Folklore: Dress colours??
From: GUEST
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 07:46 PM

Bob Bolton, you know everything! This principle is still in use with various chemical "rubs" for arthritis and such, many containing menthol.
I wonder if the dyed things also had a slightly coarser texture or "fluffed" a bit more?

Subject: RE: Folklore: Dress colours??
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 07:44 PM

... and of course some guys wear BROWN trousers... :-)

Subject: RE: Folklore: Dress colours??
From: Bob Bolton
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 07:41 PM

G'day JennieG,

Those old red (up to 19th C) flannel petticoats ... or other undergarments ... were warmer because they were dyed using mercury compounds, which set up a low-level irritation of the skin - sensed as a 'warming'. They kept you warmer ... and probably killed you a few years earlier!

Regards,

Bob

Subject: RE: Folklore: Dress colours??
From: Joybell
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 05:56 PM

Yes Helen we did too, but the Faerie Queen rhyme was still holding out against the "blue and green without a colour in between" in 1950. Only just because by the time I had my own kids the Faeries had gone. Sigh!

Subject: RE: Folklore: Dress colours??
From: White Dove
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 12:46 PM

Creep it may but I am chuffed with all these ideas!I just popped back to say thanks for the response and may now feel a little coy wearing red you knows this Christmas :-)

Cheers Roz

Subject: RE: Folklore: Dress colours??
From: Celtaddict
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 11:48 AM

In Russia, the prostitutes used to wear red stockings to advertise.
This thread begs to creep.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Dress colours??
From: Helen
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 11:25 AM

We used to be told, here in Oz, "Blue and green should never be seen, unless there's a colour in between".

Helen

Subject: RE: Folklore: Dress colours??
From: mouldy
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 02:45 AM

I don't know how widespread the saying is, but I have heard the phrase here up north, "Red shoes, no knickers". This is an assumption of the type of woman who would go out in red shoes. Is this a more modern take on the red petticoat theme?

I have also heard of wearing red to conceal blood in battle situations.

We used to chant "Blue and green should never be seen, except on a fool". Whether this refers to any risk associated with faerie, or the colours worn by fools, I have no idea. My mum just used to say it "wasn't done".

Andrea

Subject: RE: Folklore: Dress colours??
From: JennieG
Date: 14 Dec 03 - 02:37 AM

I have read that in the 19th century ladies (or women *grin*) wore red flannel petticoats because they were warmer than any other colour.
Cheers
JennieG

Subject: RE: Folklore: Dress colours??
From: mack/misophist
Date: 13 Dec 03 - 08:57 PM

I know of no songs, but I've heard a number of tales where red is worn to hide the blood that's expected to flow.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Dress colours??
From: Sorcha
Date: 13 Dec 03 - 06:54 PM

Also, in Irish folklore, ladies wore red petticoats to protect them from the Little People.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Dress colours??
From: Joybell
Date: 13 Dec 03 - 05:05 PM

Green, in foklore, is an unlucky colour often associated with the world of Faerie. When we were kids we chanted "Blue and green should never be seen except upon a Faerie Queen". Some kids said that it meant that you shouldn't wear the two colours together but I have my doubts about that. Blue is a royal colour and green is the Faerie colour so a Faerie Queen might well wear both or either.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Dress colours??
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 13 Dec 03 - 04:18 PM

It seems to be pretty much a poetic commonplace, and perhaps symbolic more of "throwing over the traces" than of prostitution in songs of this sort. Dysters, of course, are simply Dyers. "Leaboy" (there is only one; the -s indicates the possessive form), Light Bob, Lichtbob and so on occur; and sometimes a ploughboy. Explanations differ: a "lichtbob" is sometimes taken to be a soldier, and a "leaboy" a herdsman. I don't know if there is a definitive answer.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Dress colours??
From: GUEST,Auldtimer
Date: 13 Dec 03 - 04:06 PM

Often the colours were associated with which ever army regement (not football team) the "boyfriend" had joined. Lea boys AKA Light Bobs, I think we are back to regements here and "The Dyster lads", I allways asumed, were the lads in the dye works where the lassie would take her pettecoats.
Cheers

Subject: RE: Folklore: Dress colours??
From: Willa
Date: 13 Dec 03 - 03:40 PM

Hi, Roz

A verse of Siúl a rúin (or Shule Aroon) begins 'I'll dye my petticoats, dye them red' and I've seen a reference somewhere on the various links to that song that it suggests prostitution. (A 'scarlet woman', perhaps?)Don't know about the yellow lining.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Dress colours??
From: Geoff the Duck
Date: 13 Dec 03 - 02:14 PM

Not sure - lots of dresses are coloured to give the rhyme for the next line - e.g. Cocaine Blues has loads of them... John Hardy in different variants has a girl dressed in red who comes to his hanging ground and says Johnny I've come to see you dead / a girl dressed in blue who says Johnny I'll be true to you.

Of course Purple means you ar an Emperor, Scarlet means you are a Cardinal and a White means you are the Pope... Oh, and a little balck dress means you are Mary Quant (or was it CoCo Chanel?).

Quack!
Geoff the Duck.

Subject: Folklore: Dress colours??
From: White Dove
Date: 13 Dec 03 - 12:42 PM

In 'Lee boys Lassie' the wearing of certain colours conveyed a particular meaning as in black for mourning...

what then does she mean by dying her 'petticoats red' and facing 'them with the yellow'?

Also in others was there a traditional meaning to wearing green or any other colour for that matter??

I think I ought to know this but I hope someone here can give a logical or even illogical answer please :-)

Who were the Lee Boys or the Dyster Lads? Maybe thats asking a bit much?