• Journal of the Korean Society of Costume
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• v.61 no.9
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• pp.84-96
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• 2011

This paper investigates the formative features and the historical meaning of the Korean dress collection held in the Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology in Cambridge. The Museum holds a total of eleven items of koran dresses that were donated by two anthropologists in the first half of the twentieth century. Male dresses consist of a white cotton jacket (Jeogori), a under-vest (Deungbaeja) made of light wisteria rings, a headband (Manggeon) made of horsehair, a broad brimmed top hat (Gat) made of black horsehair gauze, an oilskin cover (Galmo) drawn over the hat in wet weather, and a hemispherical hat box (Gatjib). Female dresses comprise a pink silk jacket (Jeogori), a blue silk skirt (Chima) with pleats, a pair of woman's white cotton trousers (Sokgot), a black silk cap (Jobawi) decorated with pink tassels and imitation pearls, and a pair of green and magenta silk shoes (Danghye) with leather soles and metal rivets. Theses Korean dresses show what the western anthropologists had interests in. When collectors collect the folk objects, they thought much of the specificity of shape and material, the esthetic appreciation, and the representation of daily life. In terms of the value as the historical materials in the history of Korean dress, the under-vest of wisteria, the hat box, and the female dresses are worth paying attention to. The under-vest is one that was produced in earlier time among the remaining under-vests. The hat box represents that the hat belonged to the merchant classes. The female dress items show daily dresses worn by women of higher classes of the society in the 1920s.