Scarlet was a type of fine and expensivewoollencloth common inMedievalEurope. In the assessment of John Munro, 'the medievalscarlet was therefore a very high-priced, luxury, woollen broadcloth, invariably woven from the finest English wools, and always dyed with the red dyekermes, even if mixed withwoad, and other dyestuffs. There is no evidence for the use of the termscarlet for any other textile, even though other textiles, especially silks, were also dyed with kermes.'[1]
The origins of the word "scarlet" have been debated quite extensively and are crucial to understanding what scarlet actually was in the Middle Ages. The word certainly came to English from Old Frenchescarlate, which is one of a wide range of similar words in theRomance languages such as Provençalescarlat, Spanishescarlata, Portugueseescarlate, Italianscarlatto, and medieval Latinscarlat(t)um. The origin of this romance word, however, has been more widely debated. For a long time the origin was thought to be aPersian word which takes forms likesaqalāt,siqalāt, orsuqlāt.[2][3][4] However, the romance word is now thought to come from Arabicsiklāt (pluralsiklātūn), denoting very expensive, luxury silks dyed scarlet-red using the exceptionally expensive dyekermes. Arabicsiklāt is first attested around the ninth century, and now thought also to be the origin of the Persian word, which is first attested around the 1290s. The origin of the wordsiklāt is itself uncertain and may come from the Late Roman termsigillatus (Latin)/σιγιλλατον (Greek), denoting a kind of cloth decorated withseal-like patterns (from Latinsigillum 'seal'). The word then came to be used of woollen cloth dyed with the same dye. The most obvious route for the Arabic wordsiklāt to have entered the Romance languages would be via the Arabic-speaking Iberian region ofAl-Andalus, particularlyAlmería, where kermes was produced extensively.[1]
Recent work has discredited an alternative suggestion that the wordscarlet originated in the Germanic languages.Henri Pirenne, in an argument elaborated byJean-Baptiste Weckerlin,[5] argued that the termscarlet originated in the Germanic words related to Dutchschar ('shear') andlaken ('cloth'), in which case scarlet was originally highly sheared cloth. They argued that the word spread from Germanic to other European languages due to the dominance of the Low Countries in themedieval wool trade. They guessed thatscarlet became associated with the colour red because this was among the most prestigious colours, and therefore most fitting for exceptionally fine cloth. However, their ideas have not proved a good fit with the full range of European evidence: most importantly, historical evidence for the production of scarlet does not indicate more extensive shearing than other cloth. It is now thought that terms likeOld High Germanschar-lachen, Middle Low Germanscharlaken, and the Scandinavian derivatives (Danishskarlagen, Swedishskarlakan, Icelandicskarlak,skarlakan) originally referred to highly sheared cloth produced on thehorizontal treadle loom that came into use in northern Europe around the eleventh century. Meanwhile, Germanic words like Old Norseskarlat, Middle High Germanscharlât, and early modern Flemishschaerlat are all now thought to have been borrowed from the Romance words which themselves derived from Arabicsiklāt.[1]
It has long been claimed that scarlet cloth was produced in red, white, blue, green, and brown colors, among others, withcarmine red being merely the most common colour. However, recent work has argued that this is a misunderstanding of the use of colour-terms in medieval cloth production, and that references to other colours in scarlet production refers to their colour before dyeing with kermes.[1]
Scarlet cloth was particularly fashionable in Europe during the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, but fell out of fashion during the sixteenth to seventeenth.[1]
It is probable that the name of the characterWill Scarlett in theRobin Hood legends referred to this type of cloth, similarly to the common occupational surnames (e.g. Weaver, Cooper, Fletcher, etc.).