Corset

A woman's corset was part of a festive costume from the Bug River region. The maker is unknown, but it was probably a small-town seamstress, as this costume item was rarely sewn in-house. It is made of black cotton satin, and the lining partly of linen fabric and checked cotton fabric with which the front flaps and petticoats are lined. It is cut from six pieces – three making up the front, including an element forming a form of fastening called a heart, and three forming the back. It also has twelve gussets in the lower part, known as taces, cut together with the front and back lobes. In other types of corsets found in Lublin costumes, such a solution was not used. The gussets were sewn separately to the lower edge. Another distinction is the asymmetrical way of fastening the corset with small red buttons on the left side. This bodice part is also decorated only with an ornament, quilted with yellow thread in spiral motifs. There are six yellow buttons in the middle, and red buttons are sewn on the right and left sides, which are also placed on the upper part of the neckline. The side edges of the heart are trimmed with white, green and serrated amaranthine ribbon. The same is done around the taces. A long-sleeved jerkin was similarly tailored and sewn in this region, but it was made of self-woven brown fabric used for dresses. This item of clothing has a very distant past. According to Zofia Malewska, its prototype already existed in the Neolithic and Bronze Ages. In the Lublin area and other regions of our country, it was worn by young girls and married women mainly as festive attire. Older women were not supposed to wear it, as it was a regular part of a maiden’s outfit. Nowadays, members of folk groups do not respect this and like to wear them; perhaps the memory of this rule has not survived.