Robe Malfunction

[justcarol67]

No: HPFGUIDX 126209


gelite67 wrote:
> > OK, the subject is a little tongue-in-cheek but this really bugs 
> me -- don't wizards/witches wear clothes under their robes?
> 
> Tonks responded:
> 
> Well this subject does seem a bit muddled in the books and then 
> there is the movie contamination.  In the U.S. version of the books, 
> which has pictures inside the book, it show in SS/PS the kids 
> wearing what look to me like cassocks like monks wear.  In the other 
> media they wear robes like U.K. kids in boarding schools wear.  And 
> Muggle clothing under it.  This doesn't seem right.  I mean Harry 
> and Hermione are from the Muggle world, but Ron isn't.  It has 
> bothered me that he wears Muggle clothes and he doesn't live in the 
> Muggle world.  It doesn't make sense.  Especially when we see older 
> wizards trying to figure out how to look like Muggles when they go 
> to the Quidditch World Cup.  Something just doesn't jive here.
> 
> I think that older wizard wear what DD wears.  DD wears the classic 
> look for wizards.  That is a long Alb (the long gown) and an outer 
> robe or cloak.  Sometimes in winter they wear an Alb, robe and 
> cloak.  (See pictures of Snape at the Quidditch match.)  I am sure 
> that there is some sort of underwear, with some male wizards on the 
> eccentric side not wearing any. 
> 
> The kids seem to wear what they wear in boarding schools.  That is 
> the open robe over their regular clothing.


Carol responds:
In general, I agree with Tonks, except the part about the kids wearing
an open robe over their regular clothing. We're never told that the
kids' robes are open, or that they differ in any way, except in being
black, from the robes that older wizards wear. The only time we know
that Harry wears clothes under his robes (always plural, not singular)
is in a quidditch match when it's very cold. We have the scene already
mentioned, when Ron asks (or orders) Hermione to leave so he and Harry
can change to their robes, and we have the scene with young Snape
wearing only underpants (and shoes and socks) under his robes. So I'm
guessing that at least the purebloods (and halfbloods raised in the
WW) *don't* wear clothing (except underwear) under their robes,
whether they're students or adults. I think they wear closed robes
like those worn by clerics and students in the Middle Ages, and hooded
cloaks over the robes in cold weather. IOW, I think the films and Mary
Grand Pre have it wrong.

The one problem I have is the pureblood parents having no clue what
Muggle clothes look like. Surely they had Muggleborn friends when they
were in school, and also they and their children have to pass as
Muggles when they take the kids to Platform 9 3/4 and pick them up at
the end of the year, so they must have *some* idea what those clothes
look like. And oddly, even Mr. Black, Sirius Black's late father,
owned a pair of trousers that Kreacher was found "snogging." (That's
an inconsistency a copyeditor should have queried, bboy and
Lupinlore.) But I doubt that they or their children wear Muggle
clothes under their robes. So it's underwear or nothing. Or maybe
"robes" means there's some sort of "underrobe" like a slip, but we
haven't seen any such thing mentioned, and I think Harry and Ron would
protest mightily against wearing such a garment if it existed.

Some time back we had a thread with a link to medieval academic robes
that looked something like the way some of us imagine the Hogwarts
robes to look, but I don't have time to search for it now. Think of a
priest's black cassock without a white alb or a sleeveless chasuble.

I'm pretty sure that the robes and pointed black hats described in the
list of requirements for first-year students in SS/PS are based on the
traditional clothing associated with Halloween or fairytale witches
(just as brooms and cats and cauldrons are associated with those
witches). That's almost certainly the image that would come to the
mind of the average eleven-year-old encountering SS/PS for the first
time (without having seen the movies first). It's what I envision,
too, as I read the books, except that I usually forget about the hats
until JKR mentions them. I think Snape and McGonagall dress very much
like the students most of the time. Dumbledore and Flitwick I imagine
as dressing more like a traditional sorceror like Merlin, in bright
colors with stars or other decorations on the robes. But either way,
the robes are closed, and there are no Muggle clothes underneath.
Maybe boxer shorts with stars on them. Or, in Dumbledore's case,
socks. (Joking on that last point.)

Carol, pointing out that women who wear dresses have nothing but
underwear (and pantyhose) beneath them, which makes us not so
different from Snape and Dumbledore on those occasions