Here's an old ad for shirts made out of Viyella fabric. You'd almost think they were trying to sell swords and armour instead.

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Was at Inveraray castle a few months ago and the room still looks pretty much the same: The armoury a Inveraray has possibly the finest and broadest early basket hilt I have seen. And, you know, I have a couple of these shirts tucked away somewhere: Perhaps I should dig them out after seeing this, parade around like a Duke.

P.S. Reading it again, you know, this moustachioed gent is probably a model, not the old (old old) Duke at all. How times have changed!

This is exactly how I picture myself on Father's day. But more likely I'll be taking kids to swim lessons.

So that's where Lord Lucan went....

Back from the days when shirts were short, and pants were worn to the rib cage!

I love your comment JD. Enjoy the swim lessons, though. They'll need them for testing some future 'swimming in armor' topic.

Everyone knows that pants are supposed to sit at your waist, not at your hips. ;-)

And shirts weren't short either. The conventional length for shirts was long enough so that the tails could just be brought together under the crotch. It's still the conventional length for high-end bespoke dress shirts. As a matter of fact, modern shirts are usually cut shorter than this traditional length (and would ride up in a most inconvenient manner with the slightest provocation).

The thing about this picture that screamed at me was the handling of a (presumably) period blade with bare hands. One of my personal bugbears.

Well, as long as he wipes it off very thoroughly with a cloth as soon as he is finished, and gives it an equally thorough wipe with oil or Renaissance Wax, it should be fine.