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chocolatepotI got Blindspot out of the library on F_FA's recommendation as historical fiction that really reads as historical. So far the writing style is perfect - the writers (Jill Lepore and Jane Kamensky) are history PhDs - but I'm only a handful of pages in and there's already been a handful of clothing mistakes.
- A man says, in favor of Boston women, that they don't even wear shawls. According to Etymonline, it's attested in women's wear from 1767, and I can find a very, very few references in the 1770s (in which they seem to be hugely expensive), so it's not impossible that "shawls" is really the most appropriate thing here (except that it's set in 1764), but I think it's likely that they actually mean "kerchiefs" or "capuchins"/"mantles".
- Fanny describes herself working in a factory wearing "rough muslin". In 1764, muslin would have been REALLY too expensive for workhouse girls, and would never have been rough, anyway. They mean osnabrig/osnabruck/osnaburg, shitty linen.
- Fanny describes her posh father walking around the factory floor in "pale green baize", green baize being down there with linsey-woolsey in "things only slaves and the very poor wore".
It just makes me wonder how many others will crop up once I'm further in, and why people with PhDs in history can research some things and not others.
- A man says, in favor of Boston women, that they don't even wear shawls. According to Etymonline, it's attested in women's wear from 1767, and I can find a very, very few references in the 1770s (in which they seem to be hugely expensive), so it's not impossible that "shawls" is really the most appropriate thing here (except that it's set in 1764), but I think it's likely that they actually mean "kerchiefs" or "capuchins"/"mantles".
- Fanny describes herself working in a factory wearing "rough muslin". In 1764, muslin would have been REALLY too expensive for workhouse girls, and would never have been rough, anyway. They mean osnabrig/osnabruck/osnaburg, shitty linen.
- Fanny describes her posh father walking around the factory floor in "pale green baize", green baize being down there with linsey-woolsey in "things only slaves and the very poor wore".
It just makes me wonder how many others will crop up once I'm further in, and why people with PhDs in history can research some things and not others.
