Tracht - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Tracht is a traditional national costume

National costume

Folk costume expresses an identity through costume which usually to a geographic area or a period of time in history, but can also indicate social, marital and/or religious status...

in German-speaking countries. Although the word is most often associated with Austria

Austria

Austria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.4 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the...

n and Bavaria

Bavaria

Bavaria, formally the Free State of Bavaria is a state of Germany, located in the southeast of Germany. With an area of , it is the largest state by area, forming almost 20% of the total land area of Germany...

n costume

Costume

The term costume can refer to wardrobe and dress in general, or to the distinctive style of dress of a particular people, class, or period. Costume may also refer to the artistic arrangement of accessories in a picture, statue, poem, or play, appropriate to the time, place, or other circumstances...

s, many other peoples of Germany have them.

History

The Tracht of southern Germans

Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

and Austria

Austria

has inspired an entirely new fashion style, called Landhausmode (Country Estate Style). Landhausmode, influenced by the costume

Costume

s of the farmer

Farmer

A farmer is a person engaged in agriculture, who raises living organisms for food or raw materials, generally including livestock husbandry and growing crops, such as produce and grain...

s, peasant

Peasant

A peasant is an agricultural worker who generally tend to be poor and homeless-Etymology:The word is derived from 15th century French païsant meaning one from the pays, or countryside, ultimately from the Latin pagus, or outlying administrative district.- Position in society :Peasants typically...

s and rural people, and characterized by the use of linen

Linen

Linen is a textile made from the fibers of the flax plant, Linum usitatissimum. Linen is labor-intensive to manufacture, but when it is made into garments, it is valued for its exceptional coolness and freshness in hot weather....

, loden

Loden

Loden may refer to:*Water-resistant material for clothing made from sheep's wool, without removing the lanolin. It is usually green and used in Austrian traditional clothing. See Loden cape....

(a traditional type of felt

Felt

Felt is a non-woven cloth that is produced by matting, condensing and pressing woollen fibres. While some types of felt are very soft, some are tough enough to form construction materials. Felt can be of any colour, and made into any shape or size....

that has recently gained popularity worldwide) and embroidery

Embroidery

Embroidery is the art or handicraft of decorating fabric or other materials with needle and thread or yarn. Embroidery may also incorporate other materials such as metal strips, pearls, beads, quills, and sequins....

.

In northern Germany some of the best known examples are the "Friesische Tracht"

Frisians

The Frisians are a Germanic ethnic group native to the coastal parts of the Netherlands and Germany. They are concentrated in the Dutch provinces of Friesland and Groningen and, in Germany, East Frisia and North Frisia, that was a part of Denmark until 1864. They inhabit an area known as Frisia...

and the Finkenwerder

Finkenwerder

Finkenwerder is a quarter of Hamburg, Germany in the borough Hamburg-Mitte. It is the location of a plant of Airbus and its airport...

Tracht. The "Friesische Tracht" is richly decorated with bead

Bead

A bead is a small, decorative object that is usually pierced for threading or stringing. Beads range in size from under to over in diameter. A pair of beads made from Nassarius sea snail shells, approximately 100,000 years old, are thought to be the earliest known examples of jewellery. Beadwork...

s and embroidery. The quality of the work was a sign of the riches and social status of the farmer's wife wearing it. In former times it was brought into a marriage by the bride as part of her dowry

Dowry

A dowry is the money, goods, or estate that a woman brings forth to the marriage. It contrasts with bride price, which is paid to the bride's parents, and dower, which is property settled on the bride herself by the groom at the time of marriage. The same culture may simultaneously practice both...

. This costume is occasionally still worn at weddings. The "Finkenwerder Tracht" is the traditional costume of the inhabitants of an island in the Elbe river. It is worn by a local folklore group called Finkwarder Speeldeel. The long sleeved dark blue shirts with white stripes of the male costume are popular in Northern Germany for casual wear.

Visitors to the Black Forest

Black Forest

The Black Forest is a wooded mountain range in Baden-Württemberg, southwestern Germany. It is bordered by the Rhine valley to the west and south. The highest peak is the Feldberg with an elevation of 1,493 metres ....

region will be familiar with the wide brim hats decorated with big red pom poms (known as Bollenhüte) that are part of a Baden-Württemberg

Baden-Württemberg

Baden-Württemberg is one of the 16 states of Germany. Baden-Württemberg is in the southwestern part of the country to the east of the Upper Rhine, and is the third largest in both area and population of Germany's sixteen states, with an area of and 10.7 million inhabitants...

Tracht.

Displaced German peoples like the Sudetendeutsche often used events where they wore Tracht to emphasize their unity

Sudetendeutsche Landsmannschaft

The Sudetendeutsche Landsmannschaft is an organization representing Sudeten German refugees from the Sudetenland. Most of them fled to West Germany from Czechoslovakia during the Expulsion of Germans after World War II....

.

Costumes worn by professional guilds are also called "Tracht". While many have fallen into disuse, carpenter journeymen can still be seen wearing their traditional costume while traveling throughout Europe.

Other uses

Originally, the word "Tracht" had a much wider meaning in German in the sense of "what is carried/worn/borne", as it is connected to the verb "tragen", meaning "to carry/wear/bear". So "Tracht" can refer to the clothes which are worn, but e.g. also simply to a load, which is carried (until today within beekeepers' business referring to the load of honey carried in by the bees) or within the German idiom "eine Tracht Prügel" (a load (of) beating) to "a good beating".

History

Other uses

See also

External resources

Further reading