[Sca-cooks] a costume book for the Romans amongst us

[Sandra Kisner]

As usual, the BMR review is too long to post in its entirety to the list, but I'd be glad to send it to anyone who is interested.

Sandra Kisner
sjk3 at cornell.edu

>>J.L. Sebesta, L. Bonfante, The World of Roman Costume.  Madison, WI:
The University of Wisconsin Press, 2001.  Pp. xviii, 272.  ISBN v.
$24.95.

Contributors:  H. Bender, D.R. Edwards, R.A. Gergel, B. Goldman, N.
Goldman, J. Heskel, L. La Follette, L.A. Roussin, J.L. Sebesta, S.
Stone, A.M. Stout

Reviewed by Janet Burnett Grossman, The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los
Angeles (Jgrossman at Getty.edu)
Word count:  2485 words
-------------------------------

The book consists of a collection of thirteen papers on Roman dress and
clothing written by participants in a 1988 National Endowment for the
Humanities seminar. The seminar, based at the American Academy in Rome,
was led by Larissa Bonfante, one of the editors of this paperback
reprint of a book first published in hardcover in 1994. The aim of the
book is to explain the components of Roman dress and their meaning to
better understand those who wore them initially. The individual authors
follow a variety of methodological approaches to the topic, including
archaeological, philological, anthropological, and historical.

There are four main sections to the book: Roman Garments, Hairstyles,
Accessories; Roman Costume and Literary Evidence; Roman Costume and
Geographic Questions; Reconstructions. Clothing types under discussion
range in date from the Late Republic to the Late Empire, and come from
geographical regions both near and far from Rome, including areas as
remote as Asia.<<