However, this information has remained largely unknown to today's researchers as, to date, very little has been written about the miser's bag. Evelyn Haertig, Antique Combs & Purses (Carmel: Gallery Graphics Press Gwen Blakley Kinsler, “The Ingenious Miser's Purse,” Piecework 4, no. 5. ca.
Additionally, they are quite plain and generally lack the intricate beadwork and fringe typical of Victorian purses. Dates for mauve purses in this paper were based on my own observations of surviving Victorian misers' purses. Licko-Keel, Magical Miser's Purses: Crochet Patterns with Victorian Inspiration (South Kearny: The DMC Corporation, 1999).
According to both women, the ring purse was a version of a miser's purse worn on the finger. In this paper, I have linked references to scrounger purses found in nineteenth-century literature and paintings to non-fictional accounts of these accessories found in fashion guides, etiquette guides, and women's magazines.
DEFINITION AND DESCRIPTION OF FORM
The wallet is not discussed in the accompanying issue, which might indicate the ubiquity of the miserly wallet in nineteenth-century society or perhaps merely underscore its functionality. Although the wallet was still in use in the nineteenth century, several sources suggest that the stingy wallet was less known to its early twentieth century maker. Miss K's inaccuracy reveals society's lack of awareness of the shape and form of the miser's purse in the early twentieth century.
Vrek's wallets were generally made at home, although some sources suggest that ready-made Vrek's wallets were available for sale in the nineteenth century. This is one of the few aforementioned examples of a stingy wallet made with steel components before the late 1850s. Godey's first detailed discussion of knitted misers appeared more than three years later in the October 1863 issue.
Trends were not only reflected in the structures of miser's handbags, but also in their stylistic attributes. An endless variety of figural, floral, geometric and abstract motifs also adorned Victorian handbags.
PERSONAL ADORNMENT AND FUNCTION
Contemporary literary works also indicate that men kept miserly wallets in their garment pockets. Additional insight into carrying miserly handbags can be gleaned from fashion articles in American women's magazines. Jane Weaver, for example, advocated the use of stingy purses because they were “easily taken out of the pocket.”118 In the eighteenth century, the pocket was a separate accessory worn under the skirt.
Miser's purses were not mentioned in any of these publications as fashionable dresses. During his illustration of the miser's purse, Sala sardonically notes that the purse's characteristics demonstrate "the production of 'tin' in its most attractive form."143 In the nineteenth century. In the 1870s and 1880s, many writers of American women's magazines and fancywork guides affirmed the purses' functionality, moving strongly away from the early Victorian view of miser's purses as simply confusing devices.
These examples attest to the functionality of the miser's purse, and later Victorian society's acceptance of it as a utilitarian item. As we will see in the next chapter, just like the personal function of the miser's bag, its social roles were very special.
SOCIAL FUNCTION: MISER’S PURSES AS GIFTS AND COMMODITIES
Unfortunately, this image, like other miserly purse fashion signs, was not accompanied by a description of the bag or the reason for gift-giving. At the most basic level, the misers were the physical embodiment of the ideologies of the nineteenth-century cult of domesticity. The nineteenth century marked the beginning of industrial capitalism and thus the separation between the domestic and professional spheres.
A Manual of the Most Approved Rules of Conduct in Polished Society for Married and Unmarried Ladies (Philadelphia: G. B. Zieber & Co. Young, author of Our Deportment; of the Manners, Conduct and Dress of the Most Refined Society, maintained that, "mere preciousness does not constitute the soul of a gift; it is the kind feeling it manifests that gives it value. Young, Our Deportment; or, the manners, manners, and dress of the most refined society (Detroit: F. B. Dickerson and Company.
165 Lady of New York, Etiquette for Ladies; A Manual of the Most Approved Rules of Conduct in Polished Society for Married and Unmarried Ladies, 42. Heron, author of the guide Ladies' Work for Pleasure and Profit, explains: “useful objects of ornament” were to be “made cheaply, but ostentatiously” by the hostesses for “faster sales.”169 Miser's wallets were regularly recommended here.
THE MISER’S PURSE AS A LITERARY AND ARTISTIC DEVICE
Further understanding of my approach to the miser's purse as an artistic and literary device can also be gathered through an exploration of the literary interpretations of. 175 Helen Gustafson, Hanky Panky: An Intimate History of the Handkerchief (Berkeley: Ten Speed Press, 2002), xiii-7. In this example, we see how the symbolic role of the glove - as a signifier of the self - was adapted by Hawthorne to create a scenario in the novel.
In the novel, Elsie befriends the equally earnest Rose Allison, a young woman staying at Roselands as a guest of the Dinsmore family. In the foreground of the painting, Madox Brown and Emma huddle together, holding each other's hands for comfort and solace, on what appears to be a perilous journey. Madox Brown and Emma's simultaneous handling of the purse may also speak to the purse's established social connotations.
Many of the original details of the painting, such as the miser's purse, were lost in the reprinted image. This portrayal of parental devotion, as represented by Madox Brown's miser's purse, can be compared to the use of a miser's purse in Juliana Horatio Ewing's novel Jan of the Windmill: A Story of the Plains (1876). Interestingly, another miser's purse is mentioned in the context of a friendship later in the novel.
Perhaps fulfilling the purse's literary function, Becky manages to "tie" Jos to her after this meeting. These criticisms were, as we shall see, reflected in contemporary works of art and relate directly to the role played by the miser's purse as a forerunner of marriage in literature and paintings. This painting, currently in the collection of Tate Britain, is a copy of Collinson's original painting, For Sale.
In The Empty Purse, a well-dressed young woman stands in front of a stall at a fancy fair with a miser's purse in her hand. While holding the miser's purse in her left hand, the young woman holds one of the purse's rings in her gloved right hand. As we have seen, purse-making—as well as the physical miser's purse—served specific artistic and literary roles in the Victorian era and reflected contemporary moral codes.
CONCLUSION
Snyder, author of "Woman's Dainty Fingers," wrote that, "Would it be too strong a statement to say that most of the fancy work that crowds my lady's salon and boudoir represents just so much wasted energy? In In this paper I set out to explore the personal, social, literary and artistic functions of the Victorian miser's purse by examining a diverse range of contemporary cultural media.Not only was the miser's purse emblematic of the Victorian era and its domestic ideologies, but it also embodied the culture's gift-giving modes.
The purse's literary functions were also mocked by satirists of the period, who were critical of the purse's strongly sentimental undertones and wary of fortune-seeking women. Ultimately, this exercise has shown that the miser's purse was indeed an object deeply embedded in nineteenth-century popular culture, and perhaps more importantly, how the making, giving, receiving, selling, and use of the miser's purse were emblematic of the victorian era. I would first like to thank Sarah Lawrence, Director of the Master's Program in the History of Decorative Arts and Design at the Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum, Smithsonian Institution, with Parsons The New School for Design, and Ethan Robey, Assistant Director, for their help and support during the development of this paper.
Special thanks go to Susan Brown, Assistant Curator of the Textiles Department at the Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum, who supported this project from its inception and whose guidance helped bring it to fruition. Thanks also to Lourdes Font of the Fashion Institute of Technology's School of Graduate Studies, for acting as my second reader. The American Chesterfield, or The Road to Wealth, Honor, and Distinction; Being Selections from Lord Chesterfield's Letters to his Son; and Extracts from other Eminent Authors, on the Subject of Politeness: With Alterations and Additions, Suitable for the Youth of the United States.
Etiquette for Ladies; A manual of the most approved rules of conduct in polished society for married and unmarried ladies. The Great Exhibition: "Wot is to be": or probable results of the Industry of all Nations in the Year '51: showing what is to be exhibited, who is to be exhibited: in short, how it is all to be done. Oil painting – The Last of England – Birmingham Museums and Art Gallery Information Centre.” Birmingham City Council.
Purse attributed to the first quarter of the nineteenth century; probably second half of the nineteenth century, American. A purse attributed to the second quarter of the nineteenth century; probably third quarter of the nineteenth century, American. Johnson, ed., French Fashion Plates of the Romantic Era in Full Color (New York: Dover Publications Inc.
Courtesy of About.com, “The 1858 Indian Head US Gold Dollar,” The New York Times Company, http://coins.about.com/od/uscoins/ig/U-S--Historical-Gold-Coins/us- gold -coin-one-dollar-1858.htm (accessed December 8, 2009).
