Suba (clothing)

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The (or the) Suba , also as pronounced Schuba , is a Hungarian fur cloak. Equipped with sleeves, as a coat or jacket, the similarly equipped fur is known as a bunda .

In Hungary, fur clothing was part of the festive clothing of other sections of the population until recently. Sheep fur coats , vests and capes are part of the old Hungarian customs. The showpiece was the Suba, a large, almost floor-length fur cloak.

history

The word “suba” is originally Arabic “dschubba” and actually meant an upper garment with long sleeves. "According to Jolán Balogh," suba "at the time of King Matthias (second half of the 15th century) should have been understood to mean a sleeveless or sleeveless, fur-lined and trimmed robe covered with brocade or velvet, the contemporary German Screw accordingly. In the account book of Cardinal Hippolyt von Este , the nephew of Queen Beatrix from the House of Aragon , there is the entry "Suba all 'ungarescha" - Shuba in the Hungarian style for the years 1487–89. "

Bunda, the more general name for lamb coats, is often confused with that of the sleeveless Schuba, one name can mean the other form. Even for the Hungarian Debrecen it was said that “Suba” sounded strange there. The fur coat was said to be “bunda” whether it was worn by a woman or a man.

A couple from Debrecen (19th century)

The first subas that have been handed down have hardly any decorations, they were simple shepherd's coats. The Suba was worn with the leather side out. In the second half of the 19th century, some were already extremely richly embroidered, the embroidery was so precious that the item was turned over in the rain and then thrown over with the hair outwards to protect the ornaments. Only wealthy farmers could afford it. The suba is one of the oldest Hungarian garments and was the most common clothing "worn by the king as well as by the common people". It also served as a bed and a blanket.

As is customary with standard costume, a different material was chosen depending on the rank and position. The king wore a suba made of ermine skin or sable skin , wrapped in silk and gold , the chamberlain made of marten skin, and the 16th century urban citizens made of wolf skin . The castle guards wore simple sheepskin cloaks, a type of clothing that shepherds and farmers kept until at least the end of the 20th century. In the Hungarian lowlands it was only allowed to be worn as a status-related costume by the head of the family, who often presided over a clan of 30 to 40 members.

The ornate decorations are impressive. There is a certain resemblance to oriental, especially Turkish, work. Turkey had Hungarian domination for about 150 years. In the 17th century, after the Turkish era, but mainly in the 18th century, instead of sewn appliqués, the new type of ornamentation, flower embroidery, began. The embroidery motifs were almost never geometric figures, but almost without exception floral motifs, in addition to the rose these were rosemary, dahlia, tulip, carnation, violet, forget-me-nots, as well as roses and oak leaves. In ever new variations, they often barely allowed the original motif to be recognized. The motifs were carefully guarded in the individual regions, which went so far that some of the journeymen did not go on the otherwise common wandering . Initially, the Subas were embroidered in bright colors with silk or wool threads, later, under the influence of bourgeois taste, predominantly black. The embroidery in the Jazyger region ( Great Hungarian Plain ) turned solid green.

In the 19th century until around the 1870s, the most splendid product of the furriers of Szeged was "the» Schuba «, an indispensable item of clothing for shepherds and residents of homesteads". It was described by a writer as follows: “It is well known that the drawer is an ordinary piece of furniture for the farmer: chair, bed, pillow, divan, stove in winter, ice pit in summer. You can eat and dry on their fur, and when you cover a child with it, they will be particularly pleased. And then a schuba, a beautifully embroidered lambskin schuba, is a parade dress for the holidays! An ornament, hung up in the summer, a Makart bouquet , giving prestige when the owner is enveloped in its colors and occupies a majestic position. ”The Schuba or the Schuba from Szeged had such a good reputation“ that customers came from far and wide to come and see you To let the Szeged furrier make a decorated Schuba ”.

The heyday of the Suba falls in the middle of the 19th century, at a time when the merino sheep, with their silky wool, preferred for cloth production, slowly displaced the previously kept breeds of sheep that were better suited for warm winter clothing. The skins of the thick-skinned Hungarian sheep, which are also better suited for embroidery, became more expensive as a result. They came mainly from the area between the Danube and Tisza .

Kisbunda

The women did not wear the long suba that reached to the floor. The three-quarter-length cape shape of the ladies' bunda was also known as the kisbunda . The kisbunda was mostly made of fur dyed brown. The silhouette differed from that of the men with its softer and more rounded shoulders. It could be studded with black lamb. Their mainly black embroidery was richer than on the men's Suba.

Manufacturing

Individual parts of the Suba, with lamb back fur as collar trim (before 1925)

In Hódmezövásárhely around 1860, the suba was sewn from three and a half untanned sheepskins pounded in their own fat. If it was made by a furrier, he never used less than five skins: at least one skin was used for the back, one for the sides, half a skin on the right and left for the front and one for the shoulders. If the Suba got wider, more skins could be used. In Hódmezövásárhely five heads were needed for a workers tuba, eight for a wagon tuba, ten to twelve heads for a church tuba, and when spread out it would make a full circle. “The middle piece forms a colder-like, circular, neck-cut shoulder part into which two shoulder segments are inserted. Radially arranged heads are attached to this inner circle, each of these heads is sewn with the neck part to the shoulder part. At the point where the two forefeet were cut off in each case, the gaps created in this way are filled with compound semicircular fillers. These small fillers are characteristic structural elements of the Schuba. "

In order to make the seams as durable as possible, they were covered with white or colored lambskin strips (called "irha", as "irch" the term was also used in the Upper German and Transylvanian craft language. The Suba was called "Hungarian Bunda" in Transylvania). . Or a piping was sewn into the seam from a longitudinally folded leather strip , so that a small bead was formed, often in a striking color in the mostly white fur leather.

literature

Mária Kresz: Popular Hungarian furrier work . Hungary 1979, ISBN 963-13-0419-1

Web links

Commons : Bundas  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d e Günter Gall: Trachtenlook in fur - and its role models . In: Die Pelzwirtschaft , December 1968, pp. 14-16.
  2. ^ Mária Kresz: Popular Hungarian furrier work . Pp. 19-20.
  3. ^ Mária Kresz: Popular Hungarian furrier work . P. 68.
  4. ^ Mária Kresz: Popular Hungarian furrier work . P. 17.
  5. ^ Mária Kresz: Popular Hungarian furrier work . P. 23.
  6. ^ Mária Kresz: Popular Hungarian furrier work . Pp. 62-63.
  7. ^ Mária Kresz: Popular Hungarian furrier work . P. 21.
  8. ^ Mária Kresz: Popular Hungarian furrier work . Pp. 33-34.
  9. ^ Mária Kresz: Popular Hungarian furrier work . P. 42.
  10. ^ Mária Kresz: Popular Hungarian furrier work . P. 35.