CURIOSITIES: THE ORIGINS OF THE SHIRT

The shirt has very ancient origins. During the Roman Age, it was intended as a light garment, to be worn under the tunic, of considerable length and mostly hidden.

Until 1500 it had several purposes: it was worn during the sharedbath between a man and a woman; it separated the clothing from the naked body; it represented a gift and a token of love in the Middle Ages and by the end of 1600, it outlined the social membership, dividing the aristocracy from the proletariat.

In more recent times the shirt came to define the political ideology: the red shirts of Garibaldi, the black shirts of the fascists and the brown ones of the Nazis.

During the Baroque period, the importance of the shirt in men's clothing grew thanks to the invention of the tie.

The collar, which assumed strategic importance in 1800, according to the rules dictated by Lord  Brummell, was stiff, high, starched and strictly white. It contributed, by its form, to the distinction of a true dandy. The cuffs, which were starched too, were closed by the cufflinks.

In the second half of 1800, the first colored shirtsdid their appearance, worn only for day clothing.

Since the early 1900s, the shirt played different roles: sportswear, work uniform and a sign of a challenge for young people. Starting by the 1920s, the so-called of the button down shirt began, with the neck stopped by two buttons on the front.

Nowadays, the shirt is the most widespread garment among men and its use is broad also among women: maybe a symbol of a really fought emancipation.