Hose

This page includes chausses, hosen, stockings, socks, and related styles of legwear for men, women, and infants. The emphasis is on those illustrations which clearly demonstrate some aspect of their construction or attachment, as well as extant examples.

For websites on how to make hose in many of these styles, see these links.

• The stoning of St. Stephen, Perikopenbuch of St. Erentrud (Munich Statsbibliothek Clm. 15 903), c. 1140
• December, The Fécamp Psalter (KB 76 F 13, fol. 12v), c. 1180
• Fols. 12v, 17v, 18r, 22v, and 35v in the Maciejowski Bible (PML M.638), c. 1250
• Several illustrations show men wearing hose in the Rutland Psalter (British Library Additional 62925), c. 1260, including fols. 42r, 43v, 58r, 68v, 70v, 71v, and 73r
• Fishermen on an aspidochelone in a bestiary (Getty Ms. Ludwig XV 3, fol. 89v), c. 1270
• February: servants help a seated man put on his hose, the Queen Mary Psalter (British Library Royal 2 B VII, fol. 72v), c. 1310-1320
• Hose of the Archbishop of Bayonne, silk brocade, 14th century
• The Romance of Alexander (Bodl. 264), 1338-1344: Good detail of the attachment of men's hose in fol. 90v
• A fiddling fool, Voeux du paon (PML G.24, fol. 32r), c. 1350
• Cutting off a man's beard, Speculum humanae salvationis (ULB Darmstadt Hs 2505, fol. 39r), c. 1360
• Hose of Rudolf II, c. 1365
• Boy punished by his teacher, Omne Bonum (British Library Royal 6 E VI, fol. 214), c. 1360-1375
• Swordfighting, Tacuinum Sanitatis (ÖNB Codex Vindobonensis, series nova 2644, fol. 96), c. 1370-1400
• Martyrdom of St Stephen, Missale ad usum fratrum minorum (BNF Latin 757, fol. 286v), c. 1385-1390
• The Lover puts on his hose, Le roman de la rose (Douce 371, fol. 1r), c. 1400
• February in the Tres Riches Heures du Duc de Berry, c. 1412-1416
• Silk clothing, Tacuinum Sanitatis (BNF Nouvelle acquisition latine 1673, fol. 95), c. 1390-1400; several other illustrations, especially of peasants at work, also show separate hose
• A peasant fastens his hose while walking into a hen house as Aurora brings in the dawn, L’Épître Othéa (British Library Harley 4431, fol. 115v), c. 1410-1414
• Men remove their shoes and hose from a fresco in the great hall of the Castello di Manta, c. 1411
• Detail from Devonshire Hunting Tapestries - Boar and Bear Hunt, c. 1425-1430
• Drawing of hanged men by Pisanello, 1430s
• Study of a young man with his hands tied behind his back by Antonio Pisanello, c. 1433-1438
• Hanging men in St. George and the Princess of Trebizond (right side) by Antonio Pisanello, 1436-1438
• Two boys harvesting fruits from a tree in a northern Italian herbal (British Library, Sloane 4016, fol. 30), c. 1440
• The stoning of St. Stephen, The Hours of Catherine of Cleves (PML M.917, fol. 271), c. 1440
• Right panel of the St. John Altarpiece by Rogier van der Weyden, 1455-1460
• The prisoner in St. Leonhard Rescuing a Prisoner from the Church of St. Leonhard in Bad Aussee, c. 1455-1465
• St. Roch by Carlo Crivelli, c. 1493
• Knit stocking foot (Museum of London A13833), c. 1540-1560
• Boy's stockings, hand-knit and embroidered with gold and silver threads, c. 1600-1620

See the knitwear links for more knit stockings.

• Fresco (see details here and here) in the bathroom at Runkelstein Castle at Bolzano, c. 1390-1395
• Vomiting, Tacuinum Sanitatis (BNF Nouvelle acquisition latine 1673, fol. 89), 15th century
• Martyrdom of St. Bartholomew in the Speculum historiale (BNF Fr. 50, fol. 338v), 15th century
• The instruction of the young, Aristotle's Politics, Ethics, and Economics (BNF Fr. 22500, fol. 248), 15th century
• Detail from The Bearing of the Cross, c. 1445-1450
• Burial of the Wood and The Battle of Heraclius and Chosroes (from the frescoes at the Capella Maggiore of San Francesco in Arezzo by Piero della Francesca, c. 1455-1460
• Detail from Prisoners donating to St. Leonard, c. 1455-1465
• Postumius Albinus delivered to the Samnites, Mare Historiarum (BNF Latin 4915, fol. 101), 1447-1455
• Martyrdom of St. George, c. 1462-1465
• The flagellation of Christ, 1465
• Detail from Ecce Homo by Friedrich Herlin, 1468
• Martyrdom of St. John the Baptist, c. 1470-1480
• Dagobert visits the construction site at Saint-Denis, Les Grandes Chroniques de France (BNF Fr. 2609, fol. 60v), 1471
• Envy (The Seven Deadly Sins) by Hieronymus Bosch, c. 1480
• The Last Rest of Christ, c. 1480-1490
• Detail from St. Nicholas saving three from execution from the St. Nicholas altarpiece at the Church of St. George at Spisska Sobota, Slovakia
• A misericord of an acrobat from Kerk Sint-Catharina in Hoogstraten, 15th century
• Martyrdom of St. John the Baptist, end of the 15th century
• Martyrdom of St. Paul, end of the 15th century
• Boys putting up a tent for Leopold the Mild, from the Family Tree of Bamberg by Hans Part, c. 1489-1492
• Martyrdom of St. John, 1493
• The Story of Patient Griselda, Parts I, II, and III, c. 1493-1500
• Genius changes his costume to put on his wings, Le roman de la rose (Douce 195, fol. 14v), end of the 15th century
• The Bellows-Repairer by Hieronymus Bosch, 1500-1516
• Mining illustration by Robinet Testard, late 15th century; similar illustration at Gold mining, The Book of Simple Medicines (BNF Fr. 12322, fol. 121v), c. 1520-1530
• The harvest in July, in the Augsburger Monatsbilder, 1520s
• Fol. 10v in the Hennessy Book of Hours, c. 1530-1540

• Silk stocking, 14th century
• Fols. 10r, 42r, 113v, Voeux du paon (PML G.24), c. 1350
• Detail from Nativity, c. 1370-1372
• February in the Tres Riches Heures du Duc de Berry, c. 1412-1416
• Nicostrate is deceived by his wife in the Decameron (BNF Fr. 239, fol. 204v), 15th century
• A woman (the letter R on the third row), the Hours of Charles d’Angoulême (BNF Latin 1173, fol. 52r), c. 1475-1500
• A suspicious husband maltreats his wife, Le roman de la rose (Douce 195, fol. 66v), end of the 15th century
• The burial-stockings of Eleanora di Toledo, 1562

• An infant's knitted sock, 16th century. (This had been on the Museum of London's website, but I can't find it there now.)
• Conrad, aged 1 to 3 years, Schwartz Trachtenbuch, 1561