The Boots We Wear (On Bucket Boots)

[Capt. Sterling]

just one source.  But think about it.  We spend time looking at records and paintings.  Wouldn't someone such as a podiatrist maybe hold the key to this discussion?

I suppose that would depend on how many podiatrists there were in the last quarter of the 17th century and the 18th century. Check out personal journals and wills... you'd be surprised how many pairs of shoes were passed down through wills... the task now becomes how many actual wills of known GAoP pirates and even ordinary sailors are still available to read over?

Hector

[Gentleman of Fortune]

Yes... it isa small suit and there is conjecture that it is meant for a boy, but Captain Sterling, you would have to admit that Oliver Twist ain't wearing this suit... I have seen it first hand, and it extremely nice.....

Even if you do the sewing yourself, its not an easy project to tackle. Yes, you can sew it, but you are going to have to learn to do passimenterie buttons and where would you find the trim???

Jo Anne's doesn't carry trim like that.

The reproductions out there this nice are few and far between. It will take dedication, skill, and money beyond what the average to even experienced pirate-renactor is willing to do.

So, I say, a fancy gentlemen's outfit is hard to put together.

So I recomend not going that approach. I would think a simpler justaucorps made of lesser quality wool with cloth covered buttons (or pewter) would be easier and more realistic for a common sailor.

I just have a hard time with a pirate saying they stole their coat from a "gentlemen" and their coat is not shaped right, is amade of cheezy synthetic velvet, and has 2" diameter pewter buttons...

(which of course is ok if you are doing the fantasy thing....)

GoF

[Capt. Sterling]

  Wouldn't boots full of booty jingle and clank with each step?

Yes but all that booty noise wouldn't be noticable if you were wearing the correct spurs....

Hector

[Capt. Sterling]

Even if you do the sewing yourself, its not an easy project to tackle.  Yes, you can sew it, but you are going to have to learn to do passimenterie buttons and where would you find the trim???

Jo Anne's doesn't carry trim like that.

The reproductions out there this nice are few and far between.  It will take dedication, skill, and money beyond what the average to even experienced pirate-renactor is willing to do.

So, I say, a fancy gentlemen's outfit is hard to put together.

So I recomend not going that approach.  I would think a simpler justaucorps made of lesser quality wool with cloth covered buttons (or pewter) would be easier and more realistic for a common sailor.

I just have a hard time with a pirate saying they stole their coat from a "gentlemen" and their coat is not shaped right, is amade of cheezy synthetic velvet, and has 2" diameter pewter buttons...

(which of course is ok if you are doing the fantasy thing....)

GoF

But GOF already do make passimenterie buttons!! And there are certainly other places to obtain silver or gold narrowwares... certainly not Joann's!

Although I do agree that the average reenactor may not want to tackle such a project it is still doable. :)

Hector

[Gentleman of Fortune]

interesting....

is that what "trim" is called now?

Can you make some reccomendations for sources and i'll add them to my website!

Plus, Kass's patterns should be arriving soon and I have been itching to get started!

GOF

[kass]

I would think a simpler justaucorps made of lesser quality wool with cloth covered buttons (or pewter) would be easier and more realistic for a common sailor.

Amen! And there are even extant examples of them. Look here!Homespun wool coat circa 1730

Tons and tons of metallic trim doesn't look "rich", guys. It just looks fake and tacky...

[kass]

I just thought of something else. You know those heavily-embroidered jacket and waistcoats we see from this period and try to emulate? Most of those are court dress. Court dress means you wore them to Court, not even to formal balls and dinner parties. In the Royal Presense and that's all.

So the slim likelihood of a gentleman taking his court clothing on a ship AT ALL makes it even less probable that a pirate would have the opportunity to steal such things.

Don't let the rare become common and the common become rare, fellas!

[Pirate Petee]

Thanks for all the compliments fellas, I do my best. The Bulldog is just the english in me. I'd love to do some bucaneer stuff Patrick, just need a mentor.

[Capt. Sterling]

is that what "trim" is called now?

Narrow wares (sp) is a term that was used back then due to the looms the trims were woven on... being narrow...

Hector

[Capt. Sterling]

Tons and tons of metallic trim doesn't look "rich", guys. It just looks fake and tacky...

Not only that, but do you know what real silver lace looks like after 15 mins in humid weather... it turns black... and looks right nasty!!

Hector

GOF There are three places for silver and gold lace, I will get you the website lists and there is a place in India, Hand I believe, that if you could actually track down a period pattern will make the lace to your specifications... like the shoes, it might be worth thinking about... but then again, how many captains can there be wearing the same exact lace on their coats?? right now Kass has me trying to hunt down colors for worsted narrowwares or lace if you prefer....Anyone have a close up shot of the lace on the Red Suit?

[Capt. Sterling]

Plus, Kass's patterns should be arriving soon and I have been itching to get started!

GOF

Now see those already make putting a good kit together that much easier!

Hector

Post Script

What width on the lace would you be interested in?

[Skull pyrate Carter]

especially to Kass, a question. Your motto is don't make the rare common, or make the common rare, correct? Okay. Now, we do know that boots were invented before the GaoP, correct? good. People, even those of the seafaring sort wore boots, correct? Okay, now let me ask you... how many female pirates were there? how many asian pirates?? How many black captains? ... You authentics have opened up a debate of stating that to represent the GaoP you havta represent what was common, however, the percentage of pirates to the populace, I believe were not as common as they are at faire. and to believe any pirates didn't wear boots, is false, as we do know some did... which brings me to my point... if we are to follow the logic of common and rare, we have serious problems... kids were not pirates, women (except for 2) were not pirates, etc...

just a point to ponder,

so, Kass, do you go as a pirate, or as a wench... because I know of only two women pirates.

[HarborMaster]

Actually SP Carter there were ALOT of Asian Pirates., just they dont talk about it here., The fact is .,there were many many more Asian Pirates., and probably the most successful pirate of all time was an Asian woman with over 4000 vessels in her flotilla.

[Skull pyrate Carter]

the fact of an asian pirate, was a point. The typical (common) pirate was a white male. The discussion was of whether it was 'common' for a pirate to wear boots. What I was trying to bring up was the uncommon aspects that we bring up and that happen at faire...

[HarborMaster]

Oh I know., Just chimin in., but she was ruthless.

[Gentleman of Fortune]

SPC

Yes, we know that people wore boots before and after the GAoP, and we know that certain military members wore them, and people wore them as a tool for riding horses during the GAoP.

What we haven't established, is that they were a tool for sailors during the GAoP, or that wearing boots for the sake of having boots on, was a fashion trend during the 1685-1725 time frame.

We have established, that at least two women, unrealated to each other, began and continued careers as pirates during the GAoP. We can document, that those 2 women were pirates and were engaged in acts of piracy.

So far, after as much scrutiny as probably anybody has ever put into determining if boots were in fashion or used by sailors during the GAoP, the best we have is a water color of 2 Frenchman with some natives at a swiming hole wearing boots (and other unusual clothing items).And, the two were not on a ship and we do not know for certain wether they were part of the ships crew, military members, or passers by to the scene. So as far as evidence, that is all we have.

Thats it, nothing else, nada.

Now, Pirate Pete has gone out of his way to post every pre and post GAoP picture he can find of sailors wearing boots and still, has not come up with anything.

And as Foxe has stated, even if we were to find the "lost diary of Captain Black" dated 1710 that has a drawing of a pirate with boots on, it still would be one picture out of a 1000 that showd boots.

Again, we have more fotos of Captains and Admirals wearing armor than we do of any sailor wearing boots.

So comparing women disguising themselves as men and going to sea (in any capacity) to cavalry boots worn by pirates is an Apples and Oranges type of argument.

I have always stood by the statement that if you ARE going to wear boots, at least wear boots that would have been feasible to have during the GAoP. I think Pete posted some by the Cavalry Shop, and I know that Sarah Juniper can make them....

The authentic debate over wearing what is common is a goal to have that lets a group of people accurately portray the given time frame. Again using the boots for an analogy, if you have 30 pirates and 20 are wearing boots (lets just pretend that they are correct boots for the moment) that skews the picture and misrepresents how 30 pirates would have looked. If 60% of all pirates wore boots, then we would definately see that carried through in pictorial record.

On the other hand, if that group of 30 were trying to portay a group of bandits/highwaymen of the GAoP period, it would be more plausible as the highwaymen rode horses, and boots were tools to wear while riding. And so you have a better representation of what highwaymen looked like.

Now, this only matters with authentic re-enacting. If you are at the fair, and just representing yourself, heck, wear what you want.

Its a moot point really as very few things in the US call for authentic pirate re-enacting anyway. But for the few of us who are into such things, we really have to deal with these kind of guidelines so that the collective group can make a good impression.

GOF

[kass]

so, Kass, do you go as a pirate, or as a wench... because I know of only two women pirates.

Good question, SPC. And I hope you like my answer.

I do not portray a pirate. I portray a Procuress ("madam") in Covent Garden. I travel with two lovely "seamstresses" who I introduce to prosperous men what can pay for their company.

There are pirates who frequent my coffee house when they are in port. But I (my character) have never actually been on a ship, pirate or otherwise.

You've rather hit the nail on the head, as you are asking all the right questions. People answer them in different ways according to how historically accurate they want to be.

For example, there were not tons of procuresses. If everyone and her sister suddenly started portraying a coffee house owner from Covent Garden, I could no longer do that impression. I might become one of her "girls". Or I might change completely and become a street hawker, selling oranges and lemons or pins and needles, or something like that.

You see, my personal motivation is to make the impression as real as possible. That doesn't stop with me. That includes everyone around me. So if there are too many of one type of person, but not enough of another, I will change my impression to suit what's needed.

Another example -- I used to be in a 15th century household where I was the only woman. This wasn't strange as a knight's household consisted mostly of male servants with only ocassional female help. So I was a maid. The rule in the group was that the longest-standing member got to play the knight, so I was in line to be the knight's lady, but there needed to be sufficient "support staff" for that to happen. I needed to accumulate enough female recruits to fill in the ranks of a lady's waiting women AND their servants before I could be the lady of the house. I did this and for one or two events, it was brilliant.

But not everyone holds themselves to historical standards. Soon there were fifteen noblewomen and no servants. I started by stepping down as noblewoman to portray a servant, hoping that others would follow suit. But they didn't. I couldn't be all the servants by myself, so that became not the group for me.

Do you see what I'm saying? When you go to Faire and you want to play a pirate, you can do whatever you like. Really! But if you're trying to portray an historically accurate impression of a specific time and place, you might not get to do exactly what you want to do because there are not enough people/resources to make it possible. Can't be a cavalryman without a horse. Can't be a captain without a ship. Et cetera. See what I'm getting at.

However, at Faire you can do whatever you like! So do it!

[JoshuaRed]

And for the record, Kass' Procuress is truly a great impression to behold!

[kass]

I'm sorry you couldn't make it to the Pirate Feast this year, Josh. Bob couldn't either. But both my girls were there and the way they tended upon me and Captain Sterling and still had time to entertain Young Jim Hawkins was magic to behold. I was so proud of them...

You've seen the pictures, right?

[Capt. Bo of the WTF co.]

I posted this in one of these boot threads before, but I couldn't find it, so for the sake of clarity I'll do it again.

The watercolor of the Frenchmen wearing boots at a "swimming hole", was done by a French hydrographer named Duplessis, who was sailing in the Pacific with a Captain Jaques Gouin de Beauchense in 1700. He declared in his journal; "My drawings of their bodies and clothes are true to life." If you noticed the letters about the painting, they were keys to comments on certain items in the picture. There is another painting from the same journal on the next page of the book I have that shows two men in a camp of natives also wearing tall boots, carrying the long firelocks and without the overcoats as in the previous picture. A smaller painting from the same journal shows two seamen sea-lion hunting with pikes... but wearing shoes!

The first painting was done on Tierra Del Fuego, the second was done on the west coast of South America, and the sea-lion was done at the Straights of Magellan. The main thing to remember is that this was an exploration expedition, and these men were not pirates. Also, that as an exploration expedition, it would be likely that hunters would have been employed to augment the crew for the purpose of both providing meat and defense. If you look at pictures from Acadia, (or New France), you will see great resemblance in the manner of dress between the "coureier du buois" and the men in the painting. So... were they sailors or hired guns?

Capt. Bo

[Rumba Rue]

Do I have boots? Yes, but not the usual kind. Mine are from Bald Mountian Moccassians (they are hugely expensive, but hugely good), and my original pair are a simple black to the ankle. Maybe not exactly "period", but they work for me. I also have some boots from the same company that a friend gave me which are tan and come up almost to my knee. No not even close to anything "period", but for the look they are great depending on what I'm wearing.

As for boots, I see them a lot at events on people of both sexes. Usually black or brown and looking like something you'd ride a horse with. However only one person I have ever seen had enough sense to attach horse spurs to his boots to set himself apart from the regular people calling themselves pirates and wearing boots.

I give him big kudos cuz he knows what is correct. He tends to lean more toward the Highwayman look and does it well.

I wish more would do that.

[One And Only LT]

What waters are ye from? Pirates wore what they stole. So if a Rogue, a hiwayman, a farmer, a King, whomever/whatever was on a ship..

Sorry... but how often did Highwaymen, farmers and Kings go to sea to get robbed by Pyrates?

I don't mean to be so blunt...... but that post just didn't work....... If Pyrates wore what they stole. then they would have worn what was common..... I just can't see a bunch of horse riding Highwaymen in bucket boots sailing around the Carribean....

I am not afraid to answer this and blunt is the only way to go. Comin' sense, first we talk about pirates, then sailors. How many pirates where sailors first? Piracy was created because they didn't like what they were getting out of being a sailor, right?

Knowing that how'd they get a ship in the first place? Then you don't think anyone traveled, by way of ship. If that's the case my great, great, great,etc. something cousin would of never been captured by pirates, if I recall right, they were shop owners.

Here's the real deal, pirates today, and of yesterday...it does not matter, they are thieves, raiders, and plunders. Name any some were good others not. The good ones wore what they wanted, they could afford to. Nothing has changed just the canvas(fashion)...the world, it's the same today...even now some of the clothing we used to wear is unexplainable. I liked to see 300 yrs from now the archioliogst dig up some of our pirate gear, then try to put together why we wore such strange outfits, yet had such high technolgy. Can you imagine what they will come up with, you know half of it won't be right.

Now...I like the fun, I like the debate, as far as theatrics go...well I truely believe that we don't know the half of it. There is history, there is close, but I got a steamer trunk that is 19o3 and can't figure out what the hell they would need some of the gagets for and still looking into it.

In this debate I have learned alot. The boot pics. and history found fasinating, but still as far as pirates go...there is no absoult. And I wish I was better at following threads, that might benifit me even more, but I will keep it up. LOL

I want to say thanx, for telling me your true thoughts this gives me even more respect for you Patrick Hand and JoushaRed.

And to Gentlemen Of Fortune thank-you...forst wit your name sake. A favor to you in the callin'.

[Fox]

Here's the real deal, pirates today, and of yesterday...it does not matter, they are thieves, raiders, and plunders. Name any some were good others not. The good ones wore what they wanted, they could afford to. Nothing has changed just the canvas(fashion)...the world, it's the same today...even now some of the clothing we used to wear is unexplainable. I liked to see 300 yrs from now the archioliogst dig up some of our pirate gear, then try to put together why we wore such strange outfits, yet had such high technolgy.  Can you imagine what they will come up with, you know half of it won't be right.

First, and I'm not arguing, I'm curious, what wildly improbable things do pirates of today wear?

Secondly, if any archaeologist turned up a pair of bucket boots from a GAoP era wreck then nobody would argue with it, likewise nobody would argue if any historian turned up a picture or written description of a pirate in bucket boots, but they haven't. We do have evidence of pirates wearing improbable things (sashes spring to mind) in small quantities - but boots ain't amongst 'em.

Again, nobody is arguing, or has ever argued, that absolutely no pirate of the Golden Age ever wore bucket boots, just that they weren't the common fotwear they are popularly portrayed as.

[Mad Matt]

I'm just curious. Seeing that the GAoP is acknowledged as height of pyracy, exactly how many ships do we know the locations of their wrecks? I may have missed that somewhere...

Also, assuming the sailor aboard those ships all died, how far would the sea have swept them from the ship? Surely no one would believe the entire crew would have been in the bowels of the ship. Entirely opposite - I would suppose a ship that was going down would be vacated even to the possibility of the crew press-ganged into service aboard the opposing ship. (Assuming the ship was lost in battle.)

Just a couple questions to satisfy my curiosity.

[Daniel]

I'm just curious. Seeing that the GAoP is acknowledged as height of pyracy, exactly how many ships do we know the locations of their wrecks? I may have missed that somewhere...

Also, assuming the sailor aboard those ships all died, how far would the sea have swept them from the ship? Surely no one would believe the entire crew would have been in the bowels of the ship. Entirely opposite - I would suppose a ship that was going down would be vacated even to the possibility of the crew press-ganged into service aboard the opposing ship. (Assuming the ship was lost in battle.)

Just a couple questions to satisfy my curiosity.

Well, remember most ships taken by pirates were not wrecked. The pirates usually either took the ship for themselves or let the ship go after ransacking it. The three exceptions that come instantly to mind are a ship that Stede Bonnet destroyed to keep news of his piracy from Barbados, a slave ship Bartholomew Roberts destroyed as a warning to the port he was attacking, and a Boston ship Blackbeard destroyed because Boston authorities had recently hanged some pirates. In all three cases, the pirates burned the ship, so there would be very little wreckage left.

It's interesting, I think more wrecks of pirate ships than prize ships have been located today. I know of four pirate ship wrecks that have been located: Blackbeard's Queen Anne's Revenge, Billy One-Hand's Fiery Dragon, Kidd's Adventure Galley, and Bellamy's Whydah. I don't know of even one wreck of a pirate prize that has been located, though maybe someone else does...