But what were they?
Buckram in the modern sense is a coarse open texture of cotton or hemp,
loaded with gum, and used to stiffen certain articles of dress. But this
was certainly not the mediaeval sense. Nor is it easy to bring the
mediaeval uses of the term under a single explanation. Indeed Mr. Marsh
suggests that probably two different words have coalesced. Fr.-Michel says
that Bouqueran was at first applied to a light cotton stuff of the
nature of muslin, and afterwards to linen, but I do not see that he
makes out this history of the application. Douet d'Arcq, in his Comptes
de l'Argenterie, etc., explains the word simply in the modern sense, but
there seems nothing in his text to bear this out.
A quotation in Raynouard's Romance Dictionary has "Vestirs de polpra e
de bisso que est bocaran," where Raynouard renders bisso as lin; a
quotation in Ducange also makes Buckram the equivalent of Bissus; and
Michel quotes from an inventory of 1365, "unam culcitram pinctam (qu.
punctam?) albam factam de bisso aliter boquerant."
Mr. Marsh again produces quotations, in which the word is used as a
proverbial example of whiteness, and inclines to think that it was a
bleached cloth with a lustrous surface.
It certainly was not necessarily linen. Giovanni Villani, in a passage
which is curious in more ways than one, tells how the citizens of Florence
established races for their troops, and, among other prizes, was one which
consisted of a Bucherame di bambagine (of cotton). Polo, near the end of
the Book (Bk. III. ch. xxxiv.), speaking of Abyssinia, says, according to
Pauthier's text: "Et si y fait on moult beaux bouquerans et autres draps
de coton." The G. T. is, indeed, more ambiguous: "Il hi se font maint
biaus dras banbacin e bocaran" (cotton and buckram). When, however, he
uses the same expression with reference to the delicate stuffs woven on
the coast of Telingana, there can be no doubt that a cotton texture is
meant, and apparently a fine muslin. (See Bk. III. ch. xviii.) Buckram is
generally named as an article of price, chier bouquerant, rice
boquerans, etc, but not always, for Polo in one passage (Bk. II. ch.
xlv.) seems to speak of it as the clothing of the poor people of Eastern
Tibet.
Plano Carpini says the tunics of the Tartars were either of buckram
(bukeranum), of purpura (a texture, perhaps velvet), or of baudekin,
a cloth of gold (pp. 614-615). When the envoys of the Old Man of the
Mountain tried to bully St. Lewis, one had a case of daggers to be offered
in defiance, another a bouqueran for a winding sheet (Joinville, p.
136.)
In accounts of materials for the use of Anne Boleyn in the time of her
prosperity, bokeram frequently appears for "lyning and taynting" (?)
gowns, lining sleeves, cloaks, a bed, etc., but it can scarcely have been
for mere stiffening, as the colour of the buckram is generally specified
as the same as that of the dress.
